Checking equipment before departure (Photo: VNA) Hanoi (VNA) – All76 Vietnamese military personnel together with about 40 tonnes of relief goods andequipment are now ready to depart for Turkey toassist the country in recovery efforts following the devastating earthquake.
Duringa conference in Hanoi on February 11, the General Department of Logisticsassigned tasks to the military medicine team dispatched to Turkey.
Asone of the 30 members of the team, Lieut. Col Van Trong Trung, deputy head ofthe Military Hospital 354’s Orthopedic Department, said all medical equipmentsuch as machinery, medicines and surgery devices as well as personal items have been fullyprepared to meet winter conditions in Turkey.
Inparticular, six working dogs and their nine trainers will be deployed forsearch and rescue in the European country.
Ata conference held on February 10, Chief of the General Staff of Vietnam People’sArmy and Deputy Minister of National Defence Sen. Lieut. Gen. Nguyen Tan Cuongsaid as there is no direct flight service between Vietnam and Turkey, unitsconcerned are working with the Turkish Embassy in Vietnam and the VietnameseEmbassy in Turkey to arrange a flight carrying the Vietnamese soldiers to thecountry.
The quake was the mostdevastating disaster to shake Turkey since the 1939 Erzincan earthquake. As ofFebruary 11, the earthquake claimed over 24,000 lives, left thousands injured, and destroyed thousands of houses. Local authorities havedeclared a state of emergency that requires urgent search and rescue missions.
As one of the world's mostactive earthquake zones, Turkey experienced several strong earthquakes in thepast, including the one with a magnitude of 7.4 in 1999 that was the mostsevere in decades, resulting in over 17,000 fatalities. The most recent7-magnitude earthquake occurred in October 2022 in Aegean, causing 114 deathsand over 1,000 injured./.
