Earthquake Northern Italy

[Charles Pegge]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-18135898

[Petr Schreiber]

Very disturbing news,

I contacted Eros and he seems to be fine, phew!


Petr

[danbaron]

I guess that's a disadvantage of beautiful old buildings.

I think, one of the last places you want to be during an earthquake, is inside an un-reinforced multistory stone or brick building.

Those types of buildings are able to stand for centuries, but only if the forces on them are almost entirely gravitational (vertical).

When the forces are from an earthquake (horizontal), down they can come.

And, stones and bricks falling on people, is not good.

Additionally, I think it is a hard problem to retroactively reinforce those types of old buildings.

What could you do, build buttresses onto them, like on cathedrals?

Probably, there is some lateral resistance, when many of them are built one against the next.

But, that doesn't help if the lateral force from an earthquake is perpendicular to the row.

I think, the worst case is when, such a building is freestanding and vertically slender.

What would happen, if there was a big earthquake in Pisa (just my ignorant intuition/speculation)?

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I think everyone intuitively understands the situation.

One brick, set, largest face on the ground, is stable.

Two bricks, one on top of the other, is less stable.

A tower of three bricks, is even less stable.

A tower of four bricks ..

[ErosOlmi]

Yes, we felt it this time :cry:

Even if I live about 180Km north of the epicenter of earthquake, our house was dancing for few seconds yesterday night. My wife was still up and she wake up me and my son.
Earthquake is still lasting but intensity is low at the moment.

Unfortunately there were 6 deaths 4 of which were workers working on a factory open h24. A complete area of the factory went down even if it was a modern one. Someone will have to respond of that. The other 2 were old woman, one died for the fear, and the other under the roof.

The area hit by the earthquake is full of ancient buildings almost all from 14th century. Many churches wend down or partially broken.

I hope it will stop soon.

[kryton9]

Glad you are alright Eros and it is remarkable the deaths were so low. They said it was the strongest in the area since the 1300's, Wow!

[danbaron]

I bet the death toll was so low because it struck in the middle of the night on Sunday morning.

My guess is that most of the collapses were in old public structures.

Imagine how much worse it would have been, if it struck at noon on Monday (or Sunday morning --> churches).

[ErosOlmi]

Again and again. All the day.

Two strong Earthquakes plus many many little one almost every 30 mins
17 deaths so far, 14000 out of their houses.

:cry:

[Petr Schreiber]

Sad news Eros, I hope it will stop soon :(


Petr

[Charles Pegge]

That's a lot of earthquakes, Eros. Does this happen often in Northern Italy? This seems to be exceptional since you have lost a large number of historical buildings which have stood for 4-500 years.

Charles

[kryton9]

It is hitting in other areas as well that normally do not get hit. I am sorry to hear about all the quakes, deaths and damage.
earthquake.usgs.gov (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Quakes/quakes_all.php)


6605 earthquakes in the past 30 days (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/map/)

[danbaron]

"Emilia Romagna, the Italian region that has some of the country's finest culture and produces what many consider Italy (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/italy)'s best food, was coming to terms on Tuesday with the idea that it could be shaking violently for years to come."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/may/29/italy-earthquakes-800-aftershocks-emilia?newsfeed=true

Look at the photograph at the top of the article.

To me, if you lived in the area, and in such a building, it would now be almost a nightmare to go to sleep at night.

If you're inside one of those buildings when it collapses, most likely you are gone.

Is there any kind of earthquake alarm?

Something you could put in your bedroom which would wake you quickly if shaking begins?

Probably you would have at least 30 seconds to wake up and get out of the building.

But, who wants to take that risk?

I guess you could comfort yourself with the knowledge that statistically, you will likely survive - most of the buildings there have not collapsed.

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What of the buildings which did not collapse?

Are they damaged?

Are they safe?

Will they withstand another earthquake?

Is that information determinable?

I think the result is, more to keep you awake at night.

It seems like no matter how hard life is, it always finds a way to become harder - especially if you're at the economic bottom.

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Additionally, I know how the feelings of guilt begin.

You feel guilty because you live there, you feel guilty because you do not have the money to strengthen your home, you feel guilty because you do not have the money to move your family to a safer location - you blame yourself. (No one else is around for you to blame, right? So, by default, you blame the person in the mirror.)

[ErosOlmi]

There is no absolute safer place on earth where to live.
There is just a statistical safer place where to live but as you know statistics can just give you a tendence and not a security. And when something happen? Well it will be just a single point into a dispersion graph

So why feel guilty?
What about California? All should move and go somewhere else? No of course.

I think we all just need to realize we live on an active planet and we need to build infrastructures considering that in whatever place of the planet. The technology is here and it doesn't cost more than an additional 10% than standard buildings. In Japan a similar earthquake would have caused just some fear.

Here in Modena Area almost all buildings crashed down were very recent, less than 20 years old.

There is a positive story (among many): on Monday schools in that area opened again, you know life has to go on. In one school parents decided not to send their kids at school despite indications of local authorities saying all was controlled and safe. Yesterday that school completely collapsed!

[danbaron]

I live within a few miles of the San Andreas fault.

:cry:

Did the parents have a group psychic premonition?

Maybe, such a phenomenon exists.

Just because today's science doesn't understand, or cannot measure something, does not mean it cannot be real, yes?

(It seems to me, that science always thinks it knows everything. Then, when it learns more, it again becomes convinced, that, this time, it really, for certain, now, does in fact, know everything.)

:?: :idea:

[ErosOlmi]

I knew you live in that area that's why I mentioned it.

No I do not think it is some precognition but just the earth under their feet shaking without interruption since one week ago night and day.