More than 33,000 people are dead after massive earthquakes rocked Turkey and Syria last week, according to the latest estimates.

Officials in Turkey reported 29,605 deaths as of Sunday afternoon, while the total in Syria stood at 3,553, though the Associated Press noted the numbers from government-held parts of the country have not been updated in days.

The numbers keep rising as crews dig through the rubble of buildings that collapsed when 7.8-magnitude and 7.5-magnitude earthquakes hit Turkey and Syria early last week. Those who survived continue to face hardship, in part because of the need for food and shelter as temperatures drop below the freezing mark.

▶️ Drone footage taken Feb. 11, 2023, shows the extent of the damage in Kahramanmaras.

👉Survivors Still Being Found as Quake Death Toll Tops 25,000 https://t.co/I1t9wYSElg pic.twitter.com/c1lqXhD5vO

— Voice of America (@VOANews) February 11, 2023

Not all the news has been grim, as there have been reports showing that even days following the tremors, people are being found alive. Among these bright spots, according to NBC News, was a mother and child being found rescued after more than 150 hours. Pets, too, have been saved.

Rescue workers save various animals trapped under the rubble in Turkey after deadly earthquakes hit pic.twitter.com/NaMcfHJlpj

— Reuters (@Reuters) February 9, 2023

A civil war in Syria that has lasted more than a decade and displaced millions of people has complicated the rescue situation.

United Nations Under-Secretary for Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths said the world has “failed” the people in northwest Syria.

“They rightly feel abandoned,” he tweeted from the Turkey-Syria border. “Looking for international help that hasn’t arrived. My duty and our obligation is to correct this failure as fast as we can. That’s my focus now.”

Animated map of seismicity near Turkey quakes starting ~3am local time plotting Feb 6 M7.8 mainshock (pink), early aftershocks (orange), M7.5 aftershock to the north (tan), and subsequent aftershocks in the north (tan). Time vs. magnitude progression shown on bottom graph. pic.twitter.com/TTa7qdZWzO

— USGS Earthquakes (@USGS_Quakes) February 7, 2023

The region is situated on major fault lines and experiences frequent earthquakes, but the latest tremors are proving to be historic in terms of deaths and destruction.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who declared seven days of national mourning, previously said his country had been shaken by its “biggest disaster” since the 1939 Erzincan earthquake, which killed more than 30,000 people. Facing rising criticism over the nation’s early response to the disaster, Erdogan also conceded “shortcomings.”

By Sunday, Turkish officials said they issued 113 arrest warrants in connection to buildings that collapsed, and 12 people, including contractors, have already been detained, according to the BBC.

Assistance has been pouring in from around the world.

President Joe Biden said his administration authorized an “immediate” response.

“The United Nations is fully committed to supporting the response. Our teams are on the ground assessing the needs and providing assistance,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement.

New details emerged over the weekend about the unidentified object that the U.S. military shot down on Friday several miles off the coast of Alaska.

The new information comes after the U.S. military shot down an object with a “cylindrical shape” that was about the size of a small car, according to U.S. officials. The object did not appear to have any “observable surveillance equipment.”

“We have no further details about the object at this time, including any description of its capabilities, purpose or origin,” said Pentagon spokesperson Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder. “The object was about the size of a small car, so not similar in size or shape to the high-altitude surveillance balloon that was taken down off the coast of South Carolina.”

Accounts from pilots of the F-35 fighter jets that were sent to intercept the object varied, according to CNN.

U.S. officials said that the jets observed the object on Thursday night and on Friday morning before shooting it down and were only able to report back “limited” information about what they saw.

Some of the pilots reported that the object “interfered with their sensors” on their planes, the report said.

Others said that they saw no propulsion system on the object and could not explain how it was staying in the air and flying at 40,000 feet.

CNN’s Jake Tapper asked House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner (R-OH) about the reports during an interview Sunday on the network’s “State of the Union” show.

“At this point, they are just reports, so we will have to wait until we get the final information,” Turner said. “But because this thing was shot down, we have an ability to do the forensics, to do the exploitation of it when it’s found. And that will answer a lot of our questions. And, also, getting the data from the various planes, their sensors, what they actually were seeing or not seeing, in addition to what the pilots saw, will be really important.”

Turner said that the biggest development to come from the recent interactions with foreign objects entering U.S. airspace is that it “is time for the United States to take this as a turning point to invest.”

“We need more sophisticated radar systems. We have them. We just don’t have them deployed to protect high over the United States,” he said. “An integrated missile defense system — we have helped invest in Israel having an integrated missile defense system. We don’t have one ourselves.”

Related: House Intel Chairman Mike Turner: The U.S. Has Holes In Homeland Defense Infrastructure That Need Fixing