Traffic jams, water-filled underpasses, hills of concrete and rubble, buildings with deep cracks and people rendered homeless in sub-zero temperatures – the images of devastation filed past as the Indian Army’s 99-member medical team undertook an arduous five-hour drive to the quake-hit city of Iskenderun, in southern Turkey’s Hatay province, minutes after they landed in the country.
After an eight-hour-long flight from India, the Army’s 60 Para Field Hospital unit had landed in Turkey in two separate batches on Tuesday, just hours after a massive earthquake struck Turkey and killed nearly 19,000 people and injured thousands. The team had almost immediately set off for Iskenderun.