For Turkey's earthquake survivors, however, the numbers hold no solace. As the death toll in the 60-mile quake zone approaches 20,000, the ones left behind see only numberless days of suffering ahead. By Mindy Belz in Adapazari, Turkey - At the gates of State Hospital, chaos appears to rule. Ambulances squawk as they puncture a lane through the logjam of bulldozing equipment, dumptrucks, and pedestrians. MASH-unit tents fill one sidewalk, treating the dehydrated, the injured, the elderly, and the very young.
Family members wait and smoke.
At four tractor-trailers parked nearby, the stacking of the dead continues. Some corpses already have been ferried, in trucks with open beds, to unmarked graves in a cemetery north of town. This is the aftermath of Aug. 17, a day that will live in infamy, with 3,000 dead in Adapazari alone, after one of the most powerful earthquakes this century rumbled through populous northwestern Turkey. One week after the quake, the world's front pages have gone on to other matters, but the Marmara region is no closer to making peace with the upheaval. Mothers shed tears openly on street corners.