Restoring critical communications after a major earthquake in Türkiye

On February 6, 2023, a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck the province of Kahramanmaras in southeastern Türkiye. The earthquake was felt in 10 neighboring provinces and was followed by over 8,000 aftershocks, resulting in a large number of casualties. The earthquake also damaged more than 3,000 communications sites, and this caused widespread disruption to local networks and affected the communications of 13 million people. Communications networks are a lifeline for disaster relief. It is incredibly difficult to make progress in disaster relief without access to networks.

Right after the earthquake struck, the Huawei team rushed to the affected areas and worked with carriers to recover communications services. We restored more than 1,900 sites within 72 hours after the earthquake, and over 2,500 within a week. Within a month, we restored more than 3,000 damaged sites and communications in 94% of the affected areas. We also deployed more than 100 shared sites for emergency use to support disaster relief.

Our team worked tirelessly to make the impossible possible. The Ministry of Communications and three major carriers in Türkiye praised Huawei for restoring communications and maintaining critical network access for disaster relief.

Huawei engineers work side by side with carriers to rapidly get networks back online in the affected areas in Türkiye.