A magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck on Friday, 30 October 2020, about 14 km northeast of the Greek island of Samos. Many buildings were damaged or collapsed as a result of the earthquake, with the Church of the Virgin Mary in Karlovasi, Greece, partially collapsing. In the Turkish city Izmir, which was heavily affected by the earthquake, dozens of buildings were either damaged or completely collapsed. Emergency services in both countries immediately attended the scene, as rescue efforts continued into the night.
The earthquake occurred as a result of normal faulting at a shallow crustal depth within the Eurasian Plate in the eastern Aegean Sea, about 250 km north of the closest main plate boundary. Therefore, this earthquake is considered an intraplate earthquake due to its location. Following the earthquake, Turkey was affected by hundreds of aftershocks.
Initially, Turkish Minister of the Interior, Salesman Soylu, stated that at least six buildings were destroyed in Izmir, but the city's mayor Tunç Soyer later put the number of collapsed buildings closer to 20. Greek authorities from Samos stated that although buildings were damaged across the island, the worst sustained was in Karlovasi, where a large church had partially collapsed. It is the first time since the 2017 Aegean Sea earthquake that there are earthquake-related deaths in Greece.
As of 2 November, 98 people died and 994 more were injured in Turkey, all of whom resided in the city of Izmir, while two teenagers died in Greece after being crushed by a wall on the island of Samos.
Download Google Chrome
Download Mozilla Firefox
Download Opera
