And with that fading hope, the 23-year-old's grief is being replaced by rage at the government's earthquake response.
Monday's 7.8-magnitude pre-dawn tremor killed more than 7,800 people across swathes of Turkey and Syria, injured tens of thousands and left many more without shelter in the winter cold.
"I have no more tears left to cry," she said.
Despite the importance of every minute, no rescue team arrived at the scene in the critical first 12 hours after the disaster, forcing victims' relatives and local police to clear the ruins by hand, witnesses said.
And when the rescuers finally came on Monday evening, they only worked for a few hours before breaking for the night, residents told AFP.
"People revolted (on Tuesday) morning. The police had to intervene," said Celal Deniz, 61, whose brother and nephews remain trapped.
- 'No help' -
In the miserable cold, Deniz and his relatives try to warm themselves around a fire they lit in the open air, not too far from the destroyed building.
"There isn't anywhere that our rescuers cannot reach," Turkey's Red Crescent chief Kerem Kinik declared in a TV interview.
But Deniz disagreed.
"They don't know what the people have gone through," he said.
"Where have all our taxes gone, collected since 1999?" he asked, referring to a levy dubbed "the earthquake tax" that was implemented after a massive earthquake destroyed large parts of northwestern Turkey and killed 17,400 people.
The revenues -- now estimated to be worth 88 billion liras, or $4.6 billion -- were meant to have been spent on disaster prevention and the development of emergency services.
But how this money was actually spent is not publicly known.
If there aren't enough rescuers, volunteers say they will have to step in and do the hard work themselves.
"We go to places to help people who were originally supposed to be rescued by the Red Crescent, but where no help comes," said Ceren Soylu, a member of a volunteer group set up by the right-wing opposition Iyi Party.
- Opposition warning -
The Iyi Party's presence on the ground delivers a warning to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan -- whose chances of extending his rule into a third decade in May elections could hinge on his handling of Turkey's worst disaster in decades.
In Gaziantep, where violent aftershocks rumble on, residents lack almost everything. Shops are closed, there is no heat because gas lines have been cut to avoid explosions, and finding petrol is tough.
Only bakeries remain open, drawing long queues.
Some of the worst damage in Gaziantep's eponymous province took place in the most remote districts, where hundreds of buildings have collapsed.
"The roads have been partly destroyed, it's very difficult to bring aid to these areas," said Gokhan Gungor, a cook who volunteered to distribute food to survivors.
"People lack water and food there," he said.
Many survivors are feeling abandoned as they also battle cold weather, especially since many rushed outside without even having time to put on shoes when the quake struck.
On Tuesday afternoon, rescuers and search dogs were deployed again.
But it was too late, said one woman, refusing to give her name for fear of retribution from officials, as she told AFP her aunt was still buried in the rubble.
"We're now waiting for our dead," she said.
Hope turns to despair in Turkey over lack of quake help
Kahramanmaras, Turkey (AFP) Feb 7, 2023 -
It is the last time Mesut Hancer will ever hold his 15-year-old daughter's hand.
And despite the icy weather, he refuses to let it go, caressing her waxy fingers after she died in the fearsome earthquake that has devastated southern Turkey and neighbouring Syria.
Wrapped up in a fluorescent orange jacket, Hancer knelt next to Irmak's lifeless body as it lay under the rubble on a mattress near the quake's epicentre in Kahramanmaras province.
He was too grief-stricken to speak. He simply sat and held her protruding hand, the rest of her body still hidden by huge slabs of concrete.
Irmak is one of more than 6,256 people who died in Turkey and Syria after the 7.8-magnitude earthquake hit Monday, injuring thousands and leaving millions unable to return home because their apartments either no longer exist or could crumble from an aftershock.
For Irmak, it is too late.
But as each hour brings more horror, fury and frustration are rising in Kahramanmaras, where residents are lashing out at the state for what they see as its slow response to Turkey's biggest disaster in decades.
"Where is the state? Where are they? I can't retrieve my brother from the ruins. I can't reach my nephew. Look around here. There is no state official here for God's sake," Ali Sagiroglu shouted in exasperation.
His father and brother have vanished in the rubble, their fates unknown.
The devastation is overwhelming. Eight apartment buildings more than 10 storeys high in one area of the city centre collapsed during the first quake that hit before dawn.
Several powerful aftershocks have followed.
Very few were able to escape from the eight buildings, and it is believed around 150 people lived in each block.
- 'No compassion' -
Sagiroglu wasn't alone in his anger.
No longer willing to wait for help to arrive, some families used their bare hands to find their loved ones, dead or alive.
AFP teams witnessed many areas of Kahramanmaras in which groups of survivors stood alone, without any government teams offering food, medical aid or other support.
An eerie silence had descended on the city centre by Tuesday afternoon.
"Yesterday, we could hear a lot of people in the ruins crying for help but this morning, it is silent -- they must be dead because of the cold," a 40-something-year-old man said, refusing to give his name.
Those fortunate to be alive huddle around bonfires to keep warm, while others sought shelter from harsh wind and rain in their cars.
Temperatures dropped to -3 degrees Celsius (26 degrees Fahrenheit) overnight.
Cuma Yildiz, an elderly man in his sixties, accused officials of showing no mercy.
"Where are they now, where?" he asked. "They don't have mercy, they don't have compassion," he thundered.
Under pressure heading into a tough May election, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday promised to spend 100 billion liras ($5.3 billion) on various quake support measures.
He also pledged that "many" members of the armed forces would soon assist search and rescue efforts.
Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu separately went on live television from Kahramanmaras to insist that 2,000 search and rescue personnel were at work in the province.
- Growing desperation in Hatay -
Onur Kayai was so desperate for help in nearby Hatay province, close to the Syrian border, that he chased after two disaster agency vehicles to help rescue his mother and brother -- but to no avail.
"We need urgent help," the 40-year-old NGO worker said. "My mother's voice is louder, but my brother makes no sound," he said, pacing in front of a damaged building.
Semire Coban, a kindergarten teacher, was equally distressed.
She patiently waited for rescuers to arrive, but agonised that her nephew and two other trapped relatives were not responding to her calls.
"The teams prefer to work in the rubble where they can hear voices," she said.
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