Bitter cold hampered search efforts in both Turkey and Syria, but more than 80 hours after the disaster struck, 16-year-old Melda Adtas was found alive in the southern Turkish city of Antakya.
"My dear, my dear!" he called out as rescuers pulled the teen out of the rubble and the watching crowd broke into applause.
Her overjoyed father was in tears and the grieving nation cheered an agonisingly rare piece of good news.
In the 105th hour, rescuers pulled 18-month-old Yusuf Huseyin from the debris in the southeastern city of Antakya. Twenty minutes later, they rescued seven-year-old Muhammed Huseyin, NTV news channel reported.
Three-year-old Zeynep Ela Parlak was also rescued in Antakya on Friday, while in Adiyaman province, rescuers saved a 60-year-old Eyup Ak and in Gaziantep, two people were pulled out alive including a child whose age was not known.
"Half an hour ago, we managed to rescue two living people out of the rubble," the Czech fire service tweeted Friday of their teams in southeastern Turkey's Adiyaman.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted for the first time Friday that his government's search and rescue effort from this week's devastating earthquake was not going as quickly as hoped.
"So many buildings were damaged that unfortunately, we were not able to speed up our interventions as quickly as we had desired," Erdogan said during a visit to the hard-hit southern city of Adiyaman.
The first UN aid deliveries arrived on Thursday in Syrian rebel-held zones, but chances of finding survivors have dimmed since the passing of the three-day mark that experts consider a critical period to save lives.
The 7.8-magnitude quake struck early Monday as people slept.
Top aid officials were planning to visit affected areas with World Health Organization head Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus and UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths both announcing trips.
The president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Mirjana Spoljaric, said she had arrived in Aleppo.
"Communities struggling after years of fierce fighting are now crippled by the earthquake," Spoljaric tweeted on Wednesday.
"As this tragic event unfolds, people's desperate plight must be addressed."
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged the Security Council to authorise the opening of new cross-border humanitarian aid points between Turkey and Syria.
Four million people living in the rebel-held areas have had to rely on the Bab al-Hawa crossing as part of an aid operation authorised by the UN Security Council nearly a decade ago.
"This is the moment of unity, it's not a moment to politicize or to divide but it is obvious that we need massive support," Guterres said.
