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The earthquake had a shallow depth of 10 kilometers (about 6
miles), according to the United States Geological Survey. Its
epicenter was some 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of
Istanbul in the Sea of Marmara.
It was followed by several aftershocks, including one measuring
5.3. The disaster and emergency management agency urged
residents to stay away from buildings.
The earthquake was felt in neighboring regions, reports said.
Many people rushed out of homes in panic.
Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality said there were no “serious
cases” in the earthquake in a statement made on its social media
accounts.
Kemal Cebi, the mayor of Kucukcekmece district in western
Istanbul, told local broadcaster NTV that there were “no
negative developments yet” but he reported that there were
traffic jams and that many buildings were already at risk due to
the density of the area.
Turkey is crossed by two major fault lines, and earthquakes are
frequent.
A magnitude 7.8 earthquake on Feb. 6, 2023, and a second
powerful tremor that came hours later, destroyed or damaged
hundreds of thousands of buildings in 11 southern and
southeastern Turkish provinces, leaving more than 53,000 people
dead. Another 6,000 people were killed in the northern parts of
neighboring Syria.
While Istanbul was not impacted by that earthquake, the
devastation heightened fears of a similar quake with experts
citing the city’s proximity to fault lines.
In a bid to prevent damage from any future quake, both the
national government and local administrations started urban
reconstruction projects to fortify buildings at risk and started
campaigns of demolishing buildings at risk of collapse.
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