It’s the middle of the night and you are fast asleep. Suddenly you have ceiling plaster smashing down on you, pictures are falling off the walls and your bedroom is swaying. You wake your partner, grab the kids and make your way down a stairwell in the darkness as you are hurled from side to side.
You find yourself standing in the street in your pyjamas in the freezing cold. It is pitch black with only a few car headlights and mobile phone torches lighting up the dust and debris.
This is a snapshot of the kind of experiences that families and individuals caught up in the devastating earthquakes that shook Turkey and Syria in the early hours of February 6 will have endured. For those outside the event, the experiences of people inside the disaster are difficult to comprehend. Yet, despite the confusion and mayhem, and having been part of several humanitarian disaster responses around the globe, I know there are three priorities for aid.
