Nineteen Turkish personnel breathed in toxic methane inside a cave in northern Iraq. Five of them did not survive.
Türkiye’s Defense Ministry announced the deaths on Sunday. The soldiers had been searching the cave as part of a continuing effort to find the remains of Second Lieutenant Nuri Melih Bozkurt, who was killed in action on May 28, 2022, during the Claw-Lock Operation.
The cave sits at an elevation of 852 meters. The PKK once used it as a hospital, and Turkish forces cleared it of the group earlier. According to the ministry, everyone exposed to the gas was taken at once to nearby medical facilities for emergency treatment.
That did not save all of them. “Despite all medical interventions, five of our heroic personnel became martyrs,” the ministry said, adding that it felt deep sorrow over the loss. It offered condolences to the families of the dead.
Work at the site has not stopped. The Turkish Armed Forces and the country’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority, known as AFAD, are working together there. Fully equipped teams have been sent in to protect the personnel who remain and to keep looking for Bozkurt. The ministry said it remains committed to the recovery mission in northern Iraq.
The ministry gave no account of how the gas built up in the cave.
Sources
- Five Turkish soldiers die from methane gas exposure during cave search in northern Iraq
- 2025 Metina cave poisonings
