little amo aged 8 is inside, possibly alive. by the time they get her to the ambulance, though, it s clear they were too late. her mother, outside, only able to watch her everything vanish. my little one, she says. don t take her. don t let her get lost. antakya s streets a chilling patchwork of what s left standing and what s not left. in its ruins anxious crowds of rescuers and locals thinking they heard someone alive. demanding silence so they can listen again. down here is ahmed, the he rescuers say, alert, responsive, a syrian refugee. the building next to him barely hanging on at an angle. their work desperately wishing it were quicker. across the city hell has landed. this man guarding his neighbor s books with his father-in-law next to the body of his mother-in-law. he gestures behind him to where he once lived. it s kind of hard to get your head around just how inhabitable a city of this size has become so fast. literally every street you walk down has a scene li
dust and the smoke of fire settles with the dust to choke the streets. but back where we were an hour earlier there has been relief. ahmed was saved, pulled out from the hole. his family perhaps still inside. the medics keep asking him, did you hear any signs of life from them? no, he says. they say he cannot wait for them, that he must be treated after 86 hours entombed. the weight of grief even as he is saved. his friend jamil was pulled from the rubble earlier. i ve been given life again, he says. i saw death before my eyes. i saw my own grave. the same twist of fate here. there have been noises deep inside the bottom of what was once an apartment block. first out comes one man, suleman, age 21.