The world’s poorest nation, Nepal was shaken when its capital city Kathmandu, received a powerful earthquake with 7.9 magnitudes. This momentary event has transformed Nepal as ‘land of unfortunates’. The number of deaths in Kathmandu has risen each day since the event on 25th April 2015.
As notified by Geophysicists, they had a hunch that the disaster will eventually happen. It is due to the fact that the Earth’s plates were moving fast under the entire subcontinent of India, keeping Nepal under a speed of around 1.8 inches per year. Saturday’s quake revived the scene of 2001 when the earth shook under Bhuj in the year 2001. The tremors were neither unusual nor unexpected, but they were certainly large.
The after findings of the event are terrible where the falling of major historic landmarks have been reported. The buildings fell flat on earth like a pyramid of cards. The tremors were felt for a long time and were strong enough to shake the foundation and destroy buildings in a matter of seconds. It took place over an area spanning across 1,000 to 2,000 square miles, killing people in a huge count. It enveloped the cities of Kathmandu and Pokhara in one direction, along with engulfing the entire Himalaya Mountain in the other. In few seconds, approximately one to 10 feet part of India slipped northwards underneath Nepal.
From about 1.45 million people who reside in Kathmandu, the homes that fell majorly were not constructed properly. The infrastructure was weak to withstand the kind of shaking seen on Saturday. The building construction didn’t meet the construction codes and safety criteria due to which the loss occurred was way beyond expected. To make matters worse, the valley was seen focusing on the shaking of earthquake waves which elevated the scale of destruction.
The loss of lives is regretted by all, however, it was long predicted that Kathmandu was prone to suffer magnitude-8 earthquake, or even higher. As per the previously released studies, a range of between 21,000 and 42,000 fatalities were predicted if in case a magnitude-8.1 earthquake struck the area. Still, the Saturday’s shaking was estimated to be half that intensity.
This calamity has come at a delicate time in Nepal, soon after it has emerged from a long-running civil war. Its economy was just seen gradually improving. We hope that the ones bearing this loss gather all the strength to overcome the trauma and face the enormous challenges ahead.