A landslide in the middle of the night forced the evacuation of several buildings in the Üsküdar district on the Asian side of Istanbul after an incident that woke many residents to panic thinking it was an earthquake.
The İHA news agency reported that the event occurred at around 23:00 local time (21:00 CET) last night on Atlas Çiçeği Street, located in the Küplüce neighbourhood barely a kilometre from the first bridge over the Bosphorus Strait. The landslide apparently occurred in an uninhabited garden area in front of several buildings, for reasons still unknown, although the area was formerly used as a stone quarry.
The landslide caused a loud noise that triggered panic among the residents of the buildings, who immediately alerted the emergency services. Police, the Agency for Disaster and Emergency Management (AFAD) and municipal technicians arrived on the scene and, after examining the situation, ordered the evacuation of nine apartments in two four-storey buildings, as well as the closure of three shops on the ground floor. Residents have been accommodated with relatives or in hotels.
‘We woke up last night to a loud noise, we thought it was an earthquake, and then we saw what happened. For 20 years we have lived in fear every night, with small landslides in the form of falling stones. We have gone to the right institutions, to the metropolitan municipality, to the Üsküdar municipality… But they have always postponed the decision. We are in their hands’, said Celal Güneş, a neighbourhood resident.
Abdülkerim Düztaş, who runs a furniture shop located in one of the evacuated buildings, explained that the landslide was several metres long and occurred in an area only 15 metres away from the buildings. ‘This area used to be a stone quarry, and this kind of thing happens here from time to time, especially when it rains.’
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Pablo Gómez is a specialist in Turkey and has been editor-in-chief of Hispanatolia since 2011. He has been analysing current affairs and geopolitics in Turkey and the surrounding region since 2006.
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