Tremors that inflicted more suffering on a border area already plagued by conflict left people on the streets burning debris to try to stay warm.

Rescuers were working on collapsed apartments with heavy equipment as a worldwide relief effort promised food, search teams and equipment for the disaster zone.

"We live on the first floor out of three, we're too scared to return," said Imam Caglar, 42, in the Turkish city of Sanliurfa. "Our building is not safe at all."

"My mother-in-law, my father-in-law, and two of my father-in-law's sons [are trapped]," said Mahmud al-Ali in the Syrian city of Aleppo. "We are sitting here in the cold and rain and waiting for the rescuers to start digging."

The 7.8-magnitude quake struck on Monday as people slept, flattening thousands of structures, trapping an unknown number of people and potentially impacting millions.

Whole rows of buildings collapsed, leaving some of the heaviest devastation near the quake's epicenter between the Turkish cities of Gaziantep and Kahramanmaras.

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