Tourists in western Turkey and the Greek islands were shaken awake on Monday night as a 5.8-magnitude earthquake struck near the popular holiday destination of Rhodes.
A 5.8-magnitude earthquake shook the Mediterranean coastal town of Marmaris on Tuesday, Turkey’s disaster management agency said.
At least one person has d!ed in Turkey, while dozens of people sustained injuries as panicked locals tried to jump off their buildings, according to local reports.
The quake struck about 29km north of Rhodes, the largest of the Dodecanese islands near the Turkey border, at around 2.17am (local time) on Tuesday at a depth of 68km, according to the European Mediterranean Seismological Centre.
The shockwaves were felt across parts of southern Greece, western Turkey, and coastal areas of the Aegean Sea, local reports said.
A 14-year-old child d!ed in the resort town of Fethiye following the earthquake, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said. The teenager was brought to the hospital but could not be saved, he added.
Dozens of locals were taken to hospital for treatment in Mugla in Turkey after they suffered injuries while trying to rush outside their homes.
Acar Unlu, the mayor of the Turkish resort town of Marmaris, told NTV broadcast that the region was jolted by the earthquake, prompting disaster management teams to be dispatched to assess the damage.
Tourists in the Greek islands hit by the earthquake this morning said they were woken by violent shaking. “Nothing like being woken up while on the 5th floor building in Rhodes, while an earthquake is violently shaking the building! Something I can tick off the list,” said X user Steven.
Earthquakes there are relatively frequent in Turkey.
At least 53,000 people were killed in a 7.8-magnitude earthquake on 6 February 2023 followed by a second powerful tremor. The earthquakes destroyed scores of buildings and roads in 11 southern and southeastern provinces. The same incident killed 6,000 people in neighbouring Syria.
Last month a powerful 6.1-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Crete in Greece, prompting the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC) to issue an alert for a possible tsunami. Some popular sites on the island were closed amid landslides, but no significant injuries or damage were reported.
