Satellite images before and after Turkey earthquake show extent of devastation

Follow the latest on the earthquake in Turkey and Syria

Satellite images of Turkish towns affected by the earthquake show the horrifying extent of the devastation, with homes flattened and neighbourhoods left unrecognisable by the quake.

Thousands of buildings collapsed across Turkey after a disaster that led to more than 9,000 deaths.

Satellite pictures from Maxar Technologies show how the quake has affected those living in the towns of Islahiye and Nurdagi in Gaziantep province in the country’s south-east.

They show homes in Islahiye flattened, some with roofs, almost intact, atop piles of rubble.

Bulldozers can be seen clearing debris as rescue teams sift through the remains of the buildings. In some spots, very little evidence remains on plots where family homes once stood.

Surrounding roads are littered with vehicles used to ferry rescue teams to the destroyed neighbourhoods.

Teams worked through Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning across the country, pulling more bodies from the rubble of destroyed homes. More than 8,000 people have so far been pulled from the debris.

About 380,000 people have taken refuge in government shelters or hotels, authorities said.

“It’s like we woke up to hell,” said Osman Can Taninmis, whose family members were still beneath the rubble in Hatay, the worst-affected province in Turkey.

“Help isn’t coming, can’t come. We can’t reach anyone at all. Everywhere is destroyed.”

With so many buildings destroyed by the quake, many survivors in Turkey have had to sleep in cars, outside or in government shelters, AP reported.

“We don’t have a tent, we don’t have a heating stove, we don’t have anything. Our children are in bad shape. We are all getting wet under the rain and our kids are out in the cold,” Aysan Kurt, 27, told AP.

“We did not die from hunger or the earthquake, but we will die freezing from the cold.”

Images of the city of Nurdagi, which is near the epicentre of the earthquake, show emergency services set up around damaged homes and warehouses.

In the city of Duzce, in Osmaniye province in the Mediterranean region of Turkey, emergency tents fill green spaces between buildings after makeshift camps were set up to help those affected by the quake.

In 1999, the eastern city was hit by a magnitude 7.2 earthquake that killed at least 845 people.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday declared a state of emergency in 10 provinces.

He said 13 million of the country’s 85 million people have been affected by the quake.

As many as 23 million people could be affected in Turkey and Syria, according to Adelheid Marschang, a senior emergencies officer with the World Health Organisation.

He called it a “crisis on top of multiple crises”.

With additional reporting from AP