editorial | Earthquake preparation | comment

Just in case, last Saturday Jamaicans were reminded again that they live in an active earthquake zone.

The 4.9-magnitude earthquake, with its epicenter located 17 kilometers northwest of Yallas, St. Thomas, in the southeast of the island, was felt mostly in the eastern and central parishes of the island, as well as the parishes of Trelawny and St. Ann in the north. There was a strong tremor, although there were no reports of damage to buildings or injuries to people.

Although considered moderate on the seismometer, last week’s tremor was in the higher range than those recorded over the past three years, although it was much lower than the magnitude 7.3 and 7.2 earthquakes, respectively, in August 2021 and January 2020, according to data on the website of the University of the West Indies (UWI) Seismology Unit, Mona. However, it was equivalent to a magnitude 4.9 earthquake on January 29, 2020.

These numbers don’t predict anything specifically, except that, experts have warned, Jamaica will, at some point, experience a major earthquake, perhaps rivaling the 1907 earthquake, which was measured at 9.5 on the Richter scale. It caused great damage to property, especially in Kingston, and killed more than 1,000 people.

risk mitigation

The bigger point is that while Jamaica (the island records more than 200, mostly moderate, earthquakes a year) can’t predict when the next big earthquake will happen, it can prepare for the event as best it can.

As is widely known, there are two basic ways to prepare for and mitigate the potential effects of a major earthquake.

First, earthquake preparedness should be an essential part of disaster preparedness planning, as it happens for hurricanes and related events, such as floods. Citizens should know what to do in such events.

Unfortunately, this does not seem to be the case, as this newspaper pointed out in February in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in Turkey and Syria that killed tens of thousands of people. While he may have relief protocols in place and his staff and live volunteers probably know what they would be asked to do in the event of an earthquake, we have no sense that the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management has a vigorous and ongoing public awareness campaign to educate Jamaicans on how to respond. There are no regular earthquake simulations.

Organizing public information campaigns and conducting rescue drills in offices and homes is of even greater importance these days, given the recent rapid growth of mid- and high-rise buildings, particularly in the Kingston metropolitan area. In fact, trying to escape from the tenth floor of a building in the midst of a disaster is different from trying to escape from a single floor. People should be told regularly how this should be done, or if it is advisable at all. And if not, what are the alternatives.

However, the most important factor in mitigating the risk of building collapse is to ensure that this occurs as little as possible. This means that buildings are designed, engineered and constructed in a way that they are less likely to collapse in earthquakes.

Lax for Regulatory Oversight

To enforce this is, in large measure, the obligation of the public bureaucracy, which, we hope, will pay keen attention to the reminders continually sent by seismic events on the island.

In the aftermath of the earthquake in Turkey in February, many bureaucrats and people in the construction sector were arrested. They will face the courts.

In recent decades, Turkey has seen a boom in high-rise apartment building, ironically helping to fill a housing shortage exacerbated by previous earthquakes. Officials have now been accused of taking bribes to agree to skirt building codes, and several developers are said to have breached their building permit requirements. So many homes were more vulnerable when the earthquake struck.

Five years ago, Jamaica passed a new building code, ostensibly strengthening building requirements. However, many of the regulations that will support this legislation are yet to be put in place.

Moreover, as several court cases brought by citizens have shown, the process of granting permits for construction, as well as regulatory oversight, is often lax. And in some cases, developers are cracking down on opponents or exploiting legal loopholes to get their way. Add to that the list of old buildings that were not designed with earthquakes in mind.

Despite the newness of the building code, there are growing calls, including by Simon Mitchell, professor of seismology at UWI, Mona, for a review of existing codes. Similarly, architect and activist Patricia Greene promoted massive stress tests for buildings.

“We can’t predict [when the next big earthquake will happen]But we must be prepared by now, Professor Mitchell said.

We agree!

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