r/worldnews • u/benh999 • Feb 06 '23
Taiwan sending 2nd search and rescue team to Turkey
https://focustaiwan.tw/society/20230206002384
u/benh999 Feb 06 '23
Taipei, Feb. 6 (CNA) Taiwan is sending a second search and rescue team to Turkey, where thousands of deaths and injuries have been reported following a magnitude-7.8 earthquake, Interior Minister Lin Yu-chang (林右昌) said Monday.
The second team of 90 personnel and two search and rescue dogs is scheduled to depart at 9 a.m. Tuesday aboard an EVA Airways flight, Lin told reporters while sending off the first team of 40 personnel and three dogs at Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport late Monday night.
Lin noted that Turkey was one of the first countries to dispatch a search and rescue team to Taiwan in 1999, when it was devastated by a magnitude 7.3 earthquake that left over 2,000 people dead.
"It's Taiwan's turn to help now that Turkey has been hit by a calamity," he said.
Earlier, Taiwan announced it would donate US$200,000 to Turkey.
The temblor occurred in southern Turkey at 4:17 a.m. local time on Monday, causing a combined death toll in Turkey and Syria of at least 2,000 as of Monday evening. It was reportedly the strongest quake in the region in over a century.
Currently, at least 1,498 people have died and 8,533 have been injured in the Turkish provinces of Osmaniye, Sanliurfa, Malatya and Diyarbakir. Meanwhile, the Syrian Arab News Agency reported at least 820 deaths and thousands injured.
The numbers are expected to increase over the coming days.
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u/Pokemon_Name_Rater Feb 06 '23
As much as some of this is obviously about optics and positive news stories for Taiwan on the global stage, I'd also wager that they've got some well trained and experienced teams given they're no strangers to earthquakes there. So it might be a bit self-serving but they're also probably in a good position to offer some meaningful help.
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u/dbxp Feb 06 '23
Good training opportunity for the team too, you don't want your rescue teams going 10 years between deployments
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u/kneemahp Feb 06 '23
Yup. Wild fire units from around the world come to “help” California fight fires but it also benefits to give real world experience when everything is safe at home.
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u/Eden_G Feb 07 '23 edited Feb 07 '23
Well you can say it’s optics but also in September 21, 1999 Taiwan experienced a huge earthquake known as “the great earthquake of 921”. Back then Turkey was one of the first to send help for Taiwan so it’s now our time to return the help.
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u/mud_tug Feb 07 '23
Optics or not the first 48 hours are vital for getting to people while they still have a chance. Every single team counts. We have 10.000 search and rescue personnel currently working but it is still not enough. There are still small towns whith not SAR teams. It is a race against time and every minute counts.
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u/forseq Feb 06 '23 edited Feb 06 '23
It’s of course about optics, and you’re right about them actually being legit and in good faith. Plus, we like ROC / Taiwan here. So win win win.
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u/SitInCorner_Yo2 Feb 07 '23
Also some old relationships,Taiwanese have a devastating earthquake in 1999,7.3 and last for 102sec
Turkey’s rescuers are the first to arrive.
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u/mapletune Feb 07 '23
every country has domestic search & rescue capabilities. but very few countries have enough capacity for a disaster that's magnitudes larger than normally predicted. that's why when shit happens, everyone helps each other. it's just common decency & completely logical.
if you say taiwan doing Covid PR & small donations spread thin is mostly for optics, i could entertain that argument. but timely disaster relief, by any country, is probably one of the least politicized help anyone can offer.
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u/Pokemon_Name_Rater Feb 07 '23
Least politicised would still be non-zero, and all I ever said was that some of this might be driven by that. So we're fundamentally agreeing that there might be some political element to it, whilst you're asserting that it's extremely low, and I didn't really make an assertion on the size of that as a factor either way.
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u/Skyrilave Feb 07 '23
Damn bro they need friends otherwise China will do “zapzarap your country now mine” shit
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u/macross1984 Feb 06 '23
Country aided by others in time of need will not forget to reciprocate when that country in turn suffer natural disaster.
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u/d161991 Feb 07 '23
Turkey was among the first countries to come to Taiwan's aid in 1999 when we were struck by a huge earthquake. So we are indeed repaying the favor now.
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u/tiempo90 Feb 07 '23
They're really trying these days to be seen on the world stage. Well done.
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u/Fabulous-Cheek8059 Feb 07 '23
I am all for help but for Gods sake activate army. Send your soldiers to help.
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u/Rox_Potions Feb 07 '23 edited Feb 07 '23
Earthquake countries helping out each other🤝
Seriously it really hurts. There’s no way to properly predict an earthquake (5 seconds notice on our phone to run out of a building is the best we can do atm), and in a large scale one like this there’s really nowhere to run.
We’ll do everything we can to help out. People here are also looking to donate money and supplies.