The scientist Dr. Stephen Hicks stated the earthquake in Turkey as 'the worst possible scenario'. Is it just a disaster or human faults as well?

[gayesblog]

British earthquake scientist Dr. Stephen Hicks evaluated the earthquake in Turkey as "the worst possible scenario". What do you think about it? Do people also have faults for all those buindings to be destoreyed? Or is it just a disaster?

[MrOracle]

No place and no building code will completely protect you from a major natural disaster, and earthquakes above 7 are major. Today, a lot is known and understood about earthquakes, but not everything. The local conditions also play a huge part in the outcome of a major quake - where the fault lines are, soil composition, etc. What works in one location may be completely inadequate just a few blocks away.

That said, it's also easy to make very foolish mistakes. Look at the Champlain Towers building collapse in Florida a couple of years ago. No earthquake necessary - a few details overlooked during the design, a few minor changes during construction, a few later design changes (adding huge concrete planter boxes with all of that extra weight), and building owners who moved WAY too slowly when the building was showing obvious signs of failure.

Many of the buildings in Turkey were over 100 years old - older than all but the most basic building codes - and others were built across the last century. That's a long time for things to go wrong. A natural disaster is good at exposing weaknesses in systems, and no doubt, the Turks will learn a lot and new construction will improve overall, but the cost of the lesson was high.

These things can happen anywhere - it may not be an earthquake, but maybe a flood, a fire, a storm (hurricane, tornado), or a sinkhole. Certainly following building codes is the smartest and safest thing to do, and will keep most people safe, but nothing is ever 100%.

[Asad1ONE1]

So humans were definitely at fault then. Bad management.

[MrOracle]

That's a factor, but not the only one. As I said, 100+ year old buildings had no codes to follow, and codes were phased in slowly over the last century. A building built in the 90s should be much safer than a building from the 60s, etc.

I'm sure corruption is a factor too - even the US isn't completely immune to that, and it's much worse many places (China is crazy, and Russia isn't much better).

But you also have poor design, poor building (I. e., bad implementation of the building plan), and poor building maintenance as factors.

So, yes, lots of human errors to go around. Obviously I don't know the specifics of any particular building in Turkey - I'm making generalizations here.

[Asad1ONE1]

Of course not the only one. I'd say mostly the one. "Demolishment" is a thing you know.

[Vivaldi]

Buildings didn't fall in a 9 earthquake in Japan. People died of tsunami mostly.

[Vivaldi]

Buildings didn't fall in a 9 magnitude earthquake in Japan. People died of tsunami mostly.

Reply

[Vivaldi]

I live very close to the center of where 7.4 earthquake happened before. Nothing happened to the buildings I live around. Nothing. Why? Because buildings were earthquake resisdent.

[Vivaldi]

It is bad buildings that kill.

[MrOracle]

As I said, it's more complicated then that. No question, buildings built to mitigate the dangers of earthquakes are going to be much better off then those that aren't - but that's not the only factor. Soil conditions/bedrock play a huge role, as does the location of the fault lines, the direction of the slip (and thus the orientation of the shock waves), and more are all factors in what actually happens.

Clearly lots of the buildings in Turkey predated earthquake codes anywhere in the world, so you can't really fault the builders, who were only doing what was standard practice at the time. If NYC had a 7.5+ earthquake, you can bet that lots and lots of 100+ year old buildings would crumble just the same - those old brownstones weren't built to any earthquake codes.

Like I said earlier, an earthquake like this tends to reveal the weakest links in the chain.

[Vivaldi]

In Japan, at 9 magnitude earth quake, buildings didn't crumble. People died of Tsunami.

[Vivaldi]

New buildings crumbled in Turkey in Earth Quake.

[abc3643]

These earthquakes were very significant.

Unfortunately, if buildings aren't built to be able to withstand such quakes, they will fall. This is why, in many earthquake-prone areas, there are building codes that must be met by any new buildings to be able to withstand serious earthquakes. In Turkey, the building codes may not exist, or be so rigid, or even enforced if there is considerable corruption. Also, though, I suspect a good number of these buildings were old so they were never built to withstand such large quakes.

Turkey is a very earthquake-prone nation and all new building construction should be required to be able to withstand up to magnitude 9 quakes. However, that costs money and corruption may play a part in that not happening.

[Breanna_nonbinary]

Actually it’s not the worst case scenario. One thing they rarely talk about is that Turkey is building nuclear power plants in the fault lines. Considering their poor building codes and enforcement it’s only a matter of time before we have another Chernobyl.

[purplepoppy]

Does make you wonder how much shoddy workmanship played a part. Also given it's in an earthquake zone a lot of the blame has to fall on building regulations.

[JamesDiaz11]

There's very little you can do to prevent an earthquake- well, actually nothing except not live near a fault line. High population density and underdeveloped infrastructure will always make these natural disasters especially deadly, but I don't believe most countries have the capacity to limit the risk.

[genericname85]

there's always that sort of maybe spiritual attemt to rationalize guilt into human action. but i think that's merely the desparate attemt to make us feel "in control" which we really are not. these things happen, cause ultimately the universe doesn't give a shit about our existence. we don't matter in the grand scheme of things. we don't have power over earth quakes happening. like maybe in a far distant futures humans can prevent it. but certainly not today.

[AngryCarl2]

Turkish buildings are about as robust as a pack of cards. That might be forgivable in a country that isn't prone to earthquakes, but in Turkey it just means they put a very low value on human life. Japan has worse earthquakes but their buildings don't collapse, they just wash away in the following tsunami.

[NathanDavis]

humans can plan and anticipate all the want... nature is still going to happen

also true though, governments do gamble on the odds of these things happening

[ibodi]

I understand that christian blame on human it is like American lie after true happen but dont say USA is hell from disaster to prove they are humen should die.

[Petr87]

I wonder how long it will be before someone tries to blame "climate change" for this earthquake. After all, everything has to be mankind's fault somehow.