Massive pit hole surfaces in Turkey after quake

Twenty days following a devastating 7.8-magnitude earthquake, a 12-meter-deep pit hole surfaced in an empty field in central Turkey.

The 37-meter in diameter hole appeared in Konya, a city in central Turkey on the southwestern edge of the Central Anatolian Plateau, according to media outlets.

Speaking to the Turkish news agency, Fathallah Arak, director of the Research and Application Center at Konya Technical University, said: “The crater was formed before and appeared about 20 days after the large earthquakes.”

“Perhaps, this crater was ready to collapse and may have occurred during the earthquake,” he explained.

Two devastating measuring 7.8 and 7.5 on the Richter scale struck southern Turkey and northern Syria on Feb. 6. They were followed by hundreds of aftershocks. The quakes were centered in the Turkish province of Kahramanmaras, approximately 23 kilometers east of Nurdagi in the Gaziantep province near the Syrian border.

The combined death toll from both countries stands so far at more than 47,000.