Pair of sisters working to raise money for those affected by earthquake in Turkey and Syria

The death toll following a 7.8 magnitude earthquake that struck Syria and Turkey has surpassed 28,000 people.

Some people in western Washington have ties to the region. Seda Howe lives in Seattle and her sister Nehir Mullen lives in Colorado Springs, Colorado, but they both are from Turkey. Their mom and niece are there now and are okay.

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“I’ve been crying emotionally, I just don’t feel good. We trying, hanging in there as much as we can,” Mullen said. The sisters say the devastation left behind is heartbreaking.

“It is difficult for us not being able to help as much as we want to, being this far away from them,” Howe said. At first, the sisters didn’t know which family members survived.

“It was hard time, we couldn’t reach out to them for a couple of hours and you know, finally we called them and talk to my niece. My mom was already crying and they were outside, it was raining, it was bad,” Mullen said. “Since then we like still didn’t hear from everybody of our family members condition, we still don’t know.”

Since the sisters can’t be there in person, they’ve started a GoFundMe to help their family and others.

“Even a dollar donation, five dollar donation is huge over there, it can help,” Mullen said.

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