Morocco earthquake updates: Nearly 3,000 dead as rescuers reach more cities The death toll from the earthquake in Morocco is rising:
Death toll near 3,000 as rescuers reach more towns, dead, rescuers have not yet reached some remote villages
The hope of finding survivors among the rubble is dwindling, not least because many traditional mud-brick houses, common in mountain villages, have collapsed into earthen rubble and no longer leave any air pockets.
Some survivors camp in an open area along the Tizi n'Test road, which connects the remote valleys with Marrakesh. They saved what they could from the shipwreck, quickly packed their bags and fled the destroyed villages.
"The authorities are focusing on the larger communities rather than the remote villages that have suffered the most," said Hamid Ait Bouyali, 40, as he waited on the side of the road. “In some villages, the dead were still buried under the rubble."
Many villagers had no electricity or telephones after the earthquake and reported that they had to rescue their relatives and recover bodies buried under destroyed houses without help from anyone.
An earthquake can affect the collective aspect of rural life
Abdel Aouragh, a driver, told Al Jazeera he feared the earthquake would change life in the mountain villages even more than in previous years.
In the past, he said, people worked in agriculture or took tourists on scenic mountain hikes.
But recently, social media, modernity and social mobility have emptied the villages to the point where only the elderly and children remain for the winter. Today, he says, more and more people are moving to Marrakech and leaving the villages, and new building regulations are changing traditional lifestyles.
His teammate Lhassen adds: “It will be the end of the collective. From now on everything will be individual. Pumps, electricity, everything will be individual. In the morning, boys and girls go to fetch water together. This will all come to an end now. The social and collective aspect of the village will now come to an end. There are still
people in prison and dependent on basic needs, says the activist
Errachid Montassir, an activist and humanitarian worker, travels with doctors to remote villages in the Atlas Mountains.
It took five hours to reach the town of Ijjoukak because the road was blocked, Montassir told Al Jazeera. “It was a disaster and also a shock to see people still underground,” he said. “The army is doing its job to drive these people out of the territory, but it is also very, very difficult to reach these places.”
“You can imagine that there is no food, but also no blankets or beds to sleep on. » He explained that the government organizes medical camps as close to the villages as possible, but access is very difficult for residents. “There are some materials that you can take into the mountains, and sometimes we use mules for that, but it's really not enough,” Montassir said. The driver of
Boqqi is travelling to the foot of the Atlas Mountains for the second time since the earthquake.
We took bread, milk and everything we could and left it here [at the collection point],” he told Al Jazeera.
“We couldn’t continue because the roads were closed.”
“It’s heartbreaking,” the 47-year-old continued. “All this devastation... there are no words to describe it.
“In the face of the catastrophe, all Moroccans are united and everyone is trying to do their best.”
How to support the victims of the earthquake in Morocco
As heroic rescue missions continue around the clock and in virtually destroyed towns and villages, where people sometimes search through the rubble with their bare hands, organizations are raising funds to speed up rescue efforts.
Al-Maghrib Bank In
Mohammed VI demanded. that Morocco set up a bank account supported by the Ministry of Finance and Bank Al-Maghrib, Morocco's central bank, to receive aid donations from citizens and the global community, including helping private and public institutions.
Food Bank of Morocco
The non-profit organization collects food from various donors and distributes it through a network of associations and social protection institutions. They shared their banking details on social media and encouraged people to support their efforts.
Photos: Survivors Question Earthquake Relief Efforts
Many survivors of Morocco's powerful earthquake were homeless, traumatized and, in some cases, feeling abandoned by the government. They only escaped death out of fear of surviving alone after the catastrophe. The
earthquake has strained the North African kingdom's emergency relief resources, and some survivors stranded in devastated communities are angry and shocked at what they say is a lack of aid.
“We feel abandoned here. Nobody came to help us,” said Khadija Aitlkyd, 43, from the ruins of her remote village of Missirat in the Atlas Mountains. In Marrakesh, anger and frustration are growing over the lack of government help. Al Jazeera
correspondent Nicholas Haque said people had been relying on each other to provide services while the authorities had taken no action.
"People, including children, are setting up tents - neither authorities nor government officials - but families are coming together and survivors are helping each other," he said from Ouirgane, south of Marrakesh.
“Some villages were reached, but many of them received no help. We also saw helicopters flying over the mountains to investigate. »
This is a deepening crisis for the Moroccan authorities, who need all the help they can get, Haque added.
“This is a situation where people are afraid of what will happen next. For this reason, people pitched their tents away from steep hills. “It’s a safe place for them, at least for now,” he said.
Red Cross requests more than $110 million in aid for Morocco
The Red Cross has appealed for more than $110 million to provide urgently needed aid to Morocco.
“We are seeking 100 million Swiss francs ($112 million) to address the most urgent needs of the moment, including health care, water, sanitation, humanitarian assistance for housing and basic needs” – Caroline Holt, global director of operations for The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies told reporters in Geneva.
people lined up to donate blood
In Marrakesh, many people rush to hospitals to donate blood to those injured in the earthquake.
“People are lining up outside and coming here to give essentials to the injured, the victims and also those who have yet to arrive,” Al Jazeera’s Stefanie Dekker said.
The most affected area is in the Atlas Mountains, about 70 km southwest of Marrakech. Many villages do not have roads connecting them to urban areas.
“Blood is important because it helps in hospitals, but it also allows us to bring this type of blood to areas where they are still searching for survivors under the rubble,” Dekker said. “Of course, time after an earthquake is crucial to reach potential survivors. »
Algeria allocates three humanitarian aircraft to Morocco pending approval
Algeria has ordered three planes to transport a rescue team of 93 people and humanitarian aid to Morocco while waiting for the green light from Rabat, Algeria's official news agency said.
“After the Moroccan Minister of Justice announced the acceptance of Algerian aid, the Algerian authorities ordered the use of three aircraft to fly to Morocco,” he added.
Strong earthquakes shook Morocco Earthquake No. On Friday was the deadliest in Morocco in 60 years.
According to the United States Geological Survey, earthquakes of this intensity are rare in the region, and no events of magnitude 6.8 or higher were recorded within 300 km (186 miles) of Friday's epicentre.
“There haven't been many earthquakes in this part of Morocco. Most of them are in an area much further north, on the Mediterranean coast, close to the tectonic plate,” Chris Elders, a structural geologist at Curtin University in Australia, told Al Jazeera.
Health official: Rescue is a 'complex operation'
Abdelhakim Moustaid, regional health director for Ouirgane, south of Marrakesh, said the rescue was a "complex operation".
“Remember that this is a magnitude 7 earthquake that occurred in a mountainous region that is extremely difficult to reach,” he told Al Jazeera.
“In cooperation with the army, we coordinate rescue operations and the air transport of the injured to hospitals.”
Abdelqader Tarfay, secretary general of Morocco's National Health Union, told Al Jazeera that the biggest challenge for doctors and rescue teams was to save trapped people. “Then they have to work on recovering the remaining bodies from the rubble so they don’t rot,” he said.
The Qatar humanitarian aid plane arrives in Morocco
A Qatari plane loaded with humanitarian aid and a Qatari rescue team landed in Morocco to take part in the humanitarian operation. Major Khaled Abdullah al-Hamidi, commander of the Qatari rescue team, said the team's presence was coordinated and agreed with Moroccan authorities.
The Qatari team will support the Moroccan crews at two reserved locations, al-Hamidi added. Earlier, Rabat said it had accepted offers to send search and rescue teams from Qatar, Spain, the United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom.
UNICEF: Earthquake affects 100,000 children
Around 100,000 children have been affected by the severe earthquake that struck Morocco last Friday, UNICEF (the United Nations Children's Fund) reported.“Although UNICEF does not yet know the exact number of children killed and injured, the latest estimates for 2022 suggest that children make up almost a third of the Moroccan population,” the agency said in a statement. The United Nations estimates that more than 300,000 people were affected by the magnitude 6.8 earthquake that struck Marrakesh and the High Atlas Mountains.
Doctors are racing against time
doctors treated a steady stream of victims after Morocco's worst-ever earthquake that killed more than 2,800 people, but hopes of finding more survivors in the rubble were fading.
An earthquake destroys entire villages in the Atlas Mountains, where civilian rescuers and members of the Moroccan armed forces search for survivors and the bodies of victims.
“The greatest difficulties are in remote and difficult-to-access areas like here, but the wounded are open,” says Annika Coll, head of the Spanish rescue team and living in the disaster-hit community of Talat N'Yaacoub. , he told AFP.
