Key Points
- Sila the Doberman was rescued from the rubble of a building 28 days after the quakes.
- She gave birth to three pups in the wreckage.
- The owner said they survived thanks to a large bag of dog food that was left in the basement.
The owner of Sila, a 2-1/2-year-old Doberman, was surprised to see not one but four dogs emerge from the rubble of a building in Turkey's southern province of Hatay.
Kadir Keyifli said he had asked local rescue teams for help getting his dog out of the rubble but nobody had been able to enter the wreckage.
Meyako, a regional animal rescue team, came to his aid on Monday.
After hours of work, they managed to reach the basement where Sila was trapped - and saw that she had not only survived for nearly a month but also given birth to three puppies.
The miracle rescue happened 28 days after earthquakes devastated the region. The death toll in Türkiye and Syria from last month's earthquakes has neared 52,000.
Rescued from under earthquake rubble
"What did you drink here? What did you eat? Did you give birth to three of them?" one rescue worker asks in a video of the moment they reached Sila.
The workers were seen going through a narrow opening in the rubble then breaking open a hole in a door to access the room in the basement, which appeared to have sustained little damage.
"My dogs are coming out after one month. Thank God," exclaims Keyifli in the video shared by Meyako. Keyifli said Sila survived and gave birth thanks to a large bag of dog food that was left in the basement.
Sila and her pups were taken to the nearby city of Adana for treatment. Rescuers noted the mother looked skinny, but apart from that was walking unaided.
Sila joins Aleks and many other animals
Animal rescue stories are a balm for Türkiye, which has been left in shock by the worst natural disaster in the country's post-Ottoman history.
Last week, rescuers pulled another dog alive from a collapsed building in southern Türkiye.
The teams from a local municipality in central Turkey saved Aleks the dog and delivered him to Haytap, a Turkish animal protection association in the city of Antakya.
A video from DHA news agency shows rescuers reaching between two large concrete slabs and calling the trapped canine.
"Is he coming?" one rescuer was heard saying, crouching inside a small hollow in the debris of the collapsed building.
"Aleks, come, my dear," one rescuer calls to the dog. "Well done, my son."
Images then showed the rescuers embracing the dog, who appears to be alert and in good health, and offering him water.
Rescue workers have saved hundreds of trapped cats, dogs, rabbits and birds cherished by the locals in Antakya, one of the cities flattened by the disaster.
