GREENVILLE, N.C. (WNCT) — The devastation of the earthquakes in Turkey has even impacted a Turkish resident here in Eastern North Carolina.

Sahin Baser is a freshman student enrolled in a beginner English Language Arts class at Pitt Community College. He’s been here in the United States for three years. However, his mother and brother still live in Turkey and have been affected by the earthquake.

“I’m very sad. I’m very sad. it’s very hard to reach people in the winter in turkey at this time of the seasons, very cold, very cold,” Baser said. “People here really need help.”

He hopes Turkey will be able to recover from these earthquakes and hopes countries around the world can help.

“Italy, Jordan, Bulgaria, Holland, every country around the world should help Turkey and its people,” Baser said.

However, he still remains hopeful that his home country can recover from such a disaster.

Dr. David Farris, a teaching assistant professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at ECU said it’s hard to predict if the earthquake in Turkey can cause a ripple effect of seismic activity.

“The sequence of aftershocks you can predict. Anything else besides that is harder to know for certain,” Farris said. “There have been circumstances of basically we have one earthquake load sort of the next segment of fault that hasn’t slipped and you can get another earthquake. “The earthquake in Turkey probably didn’t increase the seismic hazard here in North Carolina.”

Sources from one local church say relief efforts for Turkey are in the works. We’ll keep you updated on how you can help once those details are available.