Rescuers Search for Trapped Survivors of Quake; Officials Fear Thousands Dead : Turkey: Worst temblor in nine years leaves hundreds injured and many more homeless. U.S. troops join international relief effort.

Trapped earthquake survivors cried out from under the rubble on Saturday as rescuers struggled to reach them, and officials feared the death toll could climb into the thousands.

American Red Cross officials, citing reports from the scene, said that as many as 4,000 might have been killed across eastern Turkey.

Residents of the city of Erzincan wandered from one pile of rubble to another, calling out the names of the missing. Turkish television showed a father weeping and crying out: “Oh, my children!”

Friday’s quake also left hundreds injured and thousands of people homeless in harsh winter weather, authorities said. It was the worst temblor to hit Turkey in nine years.

U.S. personnel at Incirlik air base in southern Turkey joined in the relief effort, and the Red Crescent, the Islamic version of the Red Cross, was rushing in supplies. The government declared emergency rule in the stricken area.

Erzincan, 350 miles east of Ankara, appeared to be the worst hit. The provincial governor said a quarter of the city was reduced to rubble, and there was no electricity or running water. Much of the city of 150,000 had been rebuilt from a 1939 earthquake that killed 32,000 people.

Among the collapsed buildings was Erzincan’s only hospital and a medical school.

Anatolia, the semi-official Turkish news agency, said Friday that at least 500 bodies had been recovered in Erzincan. The provincial governor, Fikret Cuhadaroglu, said 78 people were killed in towns in the eastern part of the province, also called Erzincan.

But on Saturday, authorities declined to give any definite toll.

“I am afraid the death toll will increase dramatically,” Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel told reporters in Ankara after inspecting the site.

In one of the day’s most dramatic moments, much of the nation watched as a state television reporter waded into the rubble of the medical school and called out to see if there were any survivors trapped in the debris. A weak voice answered.

Three students were found dead. Twenty-six remained trapped and others were rescued, Anatolia said without giving a number. About 60 students had been feared trapped.

With the approach of another night, attention also turned to the tens of thousands of homeless. Survivors spent Friday night outdoors in freezing temperatures as aftershocks rattled the buildings that survived the quake.

Trucks drove through the streets and their crews handed out bread.

Erzincan’s small military airport was lit with portable lamps so relief planes could land during the night. Sixty U.S. soldiers brought food, clothes, blanket and medical equipment to Erzincan from the Incirlik airbase, state television said.

Supplies and rescue workers also were arriving from across Turkey and from Britain, Germany, Italy, Switzerland and the United Nations.

Ann Stingle, a spokeswoman for the American Red Cross, said field reports from both the Red Crescent and the International Committee of the Red Cross indicated as many as 4,000 people might have been killed.

Speaking by telephone from Washington, Stingle said officials estimated the number of homeless in the tens of thousands. “It’s cold, it’s in a mountainous area,” she said.

The quake was the worst in Turkey since 1983, when 1,300 people were killed when a temblor with a magnitude of 7.1 hit Erzurum, about 100 miles east of Erzincan.

The U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, Calif., which said Friday’s quake measured 6.8, located the epicenter at about 350 miles east of Ankara. State television said the quake measured 6.2.