Follow the latest on the earthquake in Turkey and Syria
Under the rubble left behind from Turkey's earthquake, barks, miaows and even the cooing of birds have accompanied the cries of people trapped.
As rescue teams scrambled to reach areas devastated by the tremors, those who hear an animal in distress, or are worried about their own beloved pet, know who to turn to.
“There are thousands of calls coming in," says Zeynep Ceren Oktay, spokeswoman for Haytap, an animal rights charity currently working in the disaster zone.
The Haytap team sprang into action to help people and animals after the 7.8-magnitude earthquake. Local specialists were able to reach some of the collapsed buildings before international teams from countries including India, Saudi Arabia and the UK joined the effort.
Haytap members in nearby Osmaniye rushed to Antakya, a city reduced to ruins by the quake, setting up an aid tent at the Defne Tea Garden, Hatay. Later, volunteers, vets and trained search and rescue staff arrived from Istanbul to help.
Although the workers are stretched incredibly thin operating across the earthquake's affected area, they have also managed to set up an emergency tent in Malatya.
Videos showing Haytap staff and volunteers at work include footage of helping injured babies, pulling dogs from wreckage and even treating sheep at their makeshift tented surgery.
“Every minute our team is saving a life and every day we transport the pets that don’t have owners to Haytap safe houses,” Zeynep tells The National.
“Unfortunately 10 cities are affected by the earthquake and the area it covers is really big. We are trying our best to reach animals in need with limited resources."
But there are moments of light among the misery. Zeynep describes how a terrier was pulled from the rubble of a house and reunited with its owner, who also survived the earthquake.
In a video posted to the group's page, a volunteer holds a black-and-white cat in front of twisted metal and mangled concrete.
“Miracles continue to happen in Malatya,” she said.
“This cat came out of the wreckage in good health … we also found a nice, safe home for him.”
Thanks to a legal change in 2021, all pets in Turkey must now have a microchip or owners could be fined. This has raised owners' hopes of being reunited with their pets and animals.
But some owners will never return to collect them. The earthquake has killed more than 22,000 people in Turkey and Syria, undoubtedly among them thousands of pet owners, and even some survivors may struggle to take care of their pets, Zeynep says.
“It is really sad but some of the owners leave their animals to Haytap because they have lost everything and don’t have anything to maintain their needs,” she said.
The charity, founded in 2008 and run by lawyer Ahmet Kemal Senpolat, is appealing for help in transporting the hundreds of animals in their care from the disaster area, and funds to assist them in their work. But mostly, they want the world to keep survivors in their thoughts.
“We want the world to pray for us," said Zeynep. “The effect of the earthquake is something that no one can describe. People and pets have lost everything.”
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About Takalam
Date started: early 2020
Founders: Khawla Hammad and Inas Abu Shashieh
Based: Abu Dhabi
Sector: HealthTech and wellness
Number of staff: 4
Funding to date: Bootstrapped
The specs: 2019 Cadillac XT4
Price, base: Dh145,000
Engine: 2.0-litre turbocharged in-line four-cylinder engine
Transmission: Nine-speed automatic
Power: 237hp @ 5,000rpm
Torque: 350Nm @ 1,500rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 8.7L / 100km
Quick pearls of wisdom
Focus on gratitude: And do so deeply, he says. “Think of one to three things a day that you’re grateful for. It needs to be specific, too, don’t just say ‘air.’ Really think about it. If you’re grateful for, say, what your parents have done for you, that will motivate you to do more for the world.”
Know how to fight: Shetty married his wife, Radhi, three years ago (he met her in a meditation class before he went off and became a monk). He says they’ve had to learn to respect each other’s “fighting styles” – he’s a talk it-out-immediately person, while she needs space to think. “When you’re having an argument, remember, it’s not you against each other. It’s both of you against the problem. When you win, they lose. If you’re on a team you have to win together.”
WHAT IS GRAPHENE?
It was discovered in 2004, when Russian-born Manchester scientists Andrei Geim and Kostya Novoselov were experimenting with sticky tape and graphite, the material used as lead in pencils.
Placing the tape on the graphite and peeling it, they managed to rip off thin flakes of carbon. In the beginning they got flakes consisting of many layers of graphene. But when they repeated the process many times, the flakes got thinner.
By separating the graphite fragments repeatedly, they managed to create flakes that were just one atom thick. Their experiment led to graphene being isolated for the very first time.
In 2010, Geim and Novoselov were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics.
Soldier F
“I was in complete disgust at the fact that only one person was to be charged for Bloody Sunday.
“Somebody later said to me, 'you just watch - they'll drop the charge against him'. And sure enough, the charges against Soldier F would go on to be dropped.
“It's pretty hard to think that 50 years on, the State is still covering up for what happened on Bloody Sunday.”
Jimmy Duddy, nephew of John Johnson
Day 5, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance
Moment of the day When Dilruwan Perera dismissed Yasir Shah to end Pakistan’s limp resistance, the Sri Lankans charged around the field with the fevered delirium of a side not used to winning. Trouble was, they had not. The delivery was deemed a no ball. Sri Lanka had a nervy wait, but it was merely a stay of execution for the beleaguered hosts.
Stat of the day – 5 Pakistan have lost all 10 wickets on the fifth day of a Test five times since the start of 2016. It is an alarming departure for a side who had apparently erased regular collapses from their resume. “The only thing I can say, it’s not a mitigating excuse at all, but that’s a young batting line up, obviously trying to find their way,” said Mickey Arthur, Pakistan’s coach.
The verdict Test matches in the UAE are known for speeding up on the last two days, but this was extreme. The first two innings of this Test took 11 sessions to complete. The remaining two were done in less than four. The nature of Pakistan’s capitulation at the end showed just how difficult the transition is going to be in the post Misbah-ul-Haq era.
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