Heavy rain after Meteoroloji Genel Müdürlüğü’s warnings flooded İstanbul, and a teacher in Ayazağa carried stranded students on his back to safety. The rescue came as roads turned waterlogged and homes and workplaces filled with floodwater across the city.
Ayazağa sports school
A group of students training at a sports school in Ayazağa became stranded when the building flooded. Their teacher helped them out, and the moment he carried students to safety was recorded on a mobile phone camera.
The scene offered a close view of how fast the water rose in one part of the city. Parked vehicles in Ayazağa were also submerged, showing that the flood reached beyond the school grounds and into nearby streets and lots.
Kağıthane and Fatih
Elsewhere in İstanbul, teams used boats and construction equipment to rescue trapped residents in Kağıthane. In Fatih, 14-year-old Mahmut Işıldak died after being struck by electric current in floodwaters, adding a fatal outcome to the same weather event.
Those details place the Ayazağa rescue inside a wider chain of damage, not an isolated school problem. Küçüksu Deresi’s muddy water mixed with the İstanbul Boğazı and turned the water brown, while a woman in İstanbul was seen cleaning leaves from drainage grates in an effort to reduce flooding.
For families tied to the flooded school, the immediate question is how quickly normal access can return and whether similar water buildup will hit the area again after the next heavy rain. The answer on the ground is simple: students were carried out one by one, and the city’s flood response moved from cleanup to rescue in minutes. Galatasaray's latest Istanbul matchup drew attention elsewhere in the city, but the storm kept the focus on safety in Ayazağa.
