Deprem tatbikatı bitti; bununla birlikte tahliye tatbikatı devam etti.

The earthquake drill ended; nevertheless, the evacuation drill continued.

Breakdown of Deprem tatbikatı bitti; bununla birlikte tahliye tatbikatı devam etti.

• devam etmek: to continue
• bitmek: to end
• deprem tatbikatı: an earthquake drill
• tahliye tatbikatı: an evacuation drill

Questions & Answers about Deprem tatbikatı bitti; bununla birlikte tahliye tatbikatı devam etti.

Why does tatbikatı end in -ı here? Is that the accusative case?

In this sentence, -ı is not the accusative.

Here, deprem tatbikatı and tahliye tatbikatı are both indefinite noun compounds, a very common Turkish structure:

• deprem tatbikatı = earthquake drill
• tahliye tatbikatı = evacuation drill

In this pattern:

• the first noun stays bare: deprem, tahliye
• the second noun takes the compound ending -(s)ı / -(s)i / -(s)u / -(s)ü

So:

• deprem + tatbikatı
• tahliye + tatbikatı

Even though it looks like the accusative ending, it is actually part of the noun compound. You can tell it is not accusative because tatbikatı is not a direct object here; it is the subject noun phrase of the clause.

What kind of structure are deprem tatbikatı and tahliye tatbikatı exactly?

They are noun compounds.

Turkish often forms expressions like X drill, Y door, Z card by putting two nouns together:

• okul kapısı = school door
• kimlik kartı = identity card
• yangın alarmı = fire alarm
• deprem tatbikatı = earthquake drill

So deprem tatbikatı does not literally mean that the earthquake possesses the drill. It is just the normal Turkish way to say a drill related to earthquakes.

English often uses one noun directly before another noun. Turkish usually uses this compound pattern instead.