MSNBC's Nicole Pope arrived in Izmit, a city of about 500,000 residents, four hours after the quake hit.

HOSPITAL IN CHAOS
"People were dazed, walking around," she reported by telephone. "The Izmit hospital was in complete chaos. Injured people were lying around all over the place ? on bare floors. There were many dead bodies wrapped in blankets. The nurses were unable to cope with the influx of injured."

Pope said that residents of Izmit dug in the rubble with their hands. Police first on the scenes of destruction joined in the search, which was woefully lacking in heavy equipment to raise entire walls collapsed on sleeping occupants.

There were discrepancies regarding the strength of the quake, with Turkish authorities putting the figure at about 6.8 on the Richter scale but the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colo., estimating it at 7.8, which would classify it as a major geological event. The reason for the discrepancy was not immediately clear.

Bill Smith, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey, said earthquakes in western Turkey are not uncommon.

SHAKING BUILDINGS
The quake violently shook apartment blocks and buildings in Istanbul, 65 miles east of the epicenter. The city of 12 million people was plunged into darkness.

The same was true 270 miles to the west of the epicenter, where the Turkish capital Ankara also lost power.

Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit set up a crisis center in Ankara and cancelled a planned session of parliament. The Istanbul stock exchange was shut for the day and the main highway between Ankara and Istanbul closed due to a collapsed bridge.

"Unfortunately we are not in a position to give you any good news," Ecevit told reporters. "It is too early to talk about the death toll and damage. There are communications problems, telephones are cut in many places ... but we are seeking ways of getting rescue teams to help as widely as possible."

In one of the worst reported results of the quake, at least 160 sailors died at the Golcuk Naval Base and another 100 more were believed trapped in the rubble of collapsed buildings there.

State-run TRT television said the death toll by Tuesday afternoon exceeded 1,000, with 10,000 injured, figures confirmed by the prime minister's office. Dozens of reports of flattened buildings suggested the toll would rise further.

U.S. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, speaking from Istanbul where he was holding talks on a Caspian Sea oil and gas projects, told NBC's "Today" show that the scene was terrifying, not only because he was on the 12th floor of a hotel but because he could see people on the streets below screaming amid the rubble.

Gen. Henry Shelton, chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, who was visiting Ankara, was also unharmed. "Our thoughts and emotions are with the Turkish families. We are ready to help our ally in every way," the state-run Anatolian news agency quoted Shelton as saying.

While international aid agencies remained on stand-by to send foreign search and rescue teams, Turkish officials initially said they needed dogs and technical support to help them detect and rescue trapped survivors.

NBC's Andrea Mitchell reported from Washington that the U.S. government has already mobilized for an aid effort to Turkey, sending a search and rescue team and military specialists in disaster relief. In addition, Israeli, British, French and Bulgarian experts began to make their way to the region.

CRIES FOR HELP

	?Until recently we were hearing sounds. My friend Saban was calling out: ?Help me.? But for a while now there has been no sound.?
	Birol Lule

In the town of Tuzla, east of Istanbul, a construction worker stood beside the ruins of the apartment block, as residents pulled bricks away from the rubble and twisted metal.

"Until recently we were hearing sounds. My friend Saban was calling out: 'Help me.' But for a while now there has been no sound," said Birol Lule, a builder in his 30s.

A bulldozer helped with the rescue work and an ambulance stood by. More than 20 people remained trapped in the rubble of the seven-story building.

Reports said some tall buildings collapsed in Istanbul, and there were people trapped in the debris and begging for help.

"We saw the floor move, we all ran out of the house," said Ramazan Aydeniz, sitting in front of his ice-cream shop in Istanbul. "The kids, the elder were all in a panic."

  MSNBC's Nicole Pope reports on woefully inadequate rescue efforts

MARMARA SEA COAST HIT HARD
The industrial province of Kocaeli on the Marmara Sea was the worst hit. At the quake epicenter near Izmit, bridges, homes and buildings collapsed. In Izmit, residents said rescuers were trying to reach people trapped in the ruins of a collapsed apartment block. A fire broke out at the major oil refinery owned by Tupras. Firefighters quickly controlled the blaze.

"Tell me my children are alive," pleaded Muzaffar Yarla, grabbing the arm of a reporter in Izmit as survivors clawed at the rubble of their homes to search for loved ones.

Minutes later a pair of bare feet, clearly lifeless, poked through the tangle of steel and concrete and the search halted briefly before neighbors struck up a loud wail.

Vehicles on the main highway linking Istanbul and Ankara slammed into each other during the earthquake. Ambulances, sirens blaring, wove their way through traffic-clogged streets of the capital but reporters saw little sign of rescue teams searching the damaged buildings along the main road to the town.

"We never felt such a strong earthquake before," said Bora Dalkilic, a college student in Istanbul. "We are staying outside in case there is another earthquake."

The quake occurred at a relatively shallow 6 miles below the surface. More than 200 aftershocks followed, the Istanbul-based Kandilli observatory said.

The Associated Press reported that historical sites in Istanbul such as the Blue Mosque, Saint Sophia and Topkapi Palace, the seat of the Ottoman sultans, did not appear to suffer damage.

A 6.3 magnitude quake that hit Turkey on June 27, 1998, killed 144 people and injured over 1,500 in and around the southern city of Adana.

MSNBC's Nicole Pope in Izmit and The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.