The death toll from a powerful magnitude 7.0 quake in the Aegean Sea that struck Turkey and Greece on Friday has risen to at least 57 with over 900 people injured, local authorities said Sunday.
The tally includes two people who died after being trapped under a collapsed wall on the Greek island of Samos, both of them teenagers.
Rescue operations continued at eight collapsed buildings in Turkey's coastal province of Izmir, with many residents spending the night in tents or cars in fear of aftershocks and further collapses.
Most of the collapsed buildings were concentrated in the district of Bayrakli. Although the area, which sits on reclaimed land, is located a distance from the quake's epicenter, seismologists say the damage was exacerbated due to buildings' soft foundations.
"The shaking went on for a long time, so I hid under the table to be safe. All the kitchen cabinets flew open, and the LCD television in the living room fell over. It was the worst earthquake I have felt in my life," said Shuri Deguchi, a 42-year-old Japanese woman living near Bayrakli.
The temblor occurred at 1:51 p.m. Friday local time and originated at a depth of about 20 kilometers near Samos, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It also triggered a tsunami, causing some coastal residential areas to be inundated with sea water.
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