Reply to I am a earthquake seismologist. AMA. 5th anniversary of Louisa Quake

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Could the high death toll in Amatrice have been avoided today?[/quote]

Possibly. [b] 6.2 is not that big;[/b] earthquake resistant building, for example, would help.   I have not really looked at anything related to that earthquake (I had medical tests the AM, and just finished that up).

A good way to look at this is to go to 2010.  Two earthquakes, a 7.1 in Haiti, and an 8.8 in Chile occurred 6 weeks apart.  The Chilean event was about 100x bigger than the Haiti earthquake, but had very few casualties.  Why?  Building codes.  By comparison, the smaller Haitian earthquake hit in a poor city with no building codes; possibly over 200,000 people were killed.  Building codes and code enforcement matter.

[/quote]

At least 75 people have died and entire towns have been leveled. How can you say 6.2 is not "big" in relation to the structures the quake is hitting. It may not be "big" compared to an 8.2, but a 6.2 can cause massive damage and kill people.[/quote]

Big is defined by energy release.  6.2 is not that big.  Killing people is not what defines the size of an earthquake.  Rather, it is the energy (or more accurately) moment release of the earthquake, not the human effects.  The human effects can be mitigated with proper construction techniques.  [/quote]

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