Sumaiya Kabir
Bangladesh is no stranger to natural disasters. Floods, tornados, landslides, droughts are occurrences we have accepted and battle each and every year in a routinely manner. However, earthquakes, although frequently predicted, never come in a timely manner, which in turn make them more terrifying. This time around, the prediction has strong data to back it up with indications that the earthquake has been building up from 500 years ago.
Michael Steckler, a geophysicist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory was the one to issue the warning of an earthquake which may have a magnitude ranging from 8.2 to 9. Along with several other geologists, he published a paper titled, “Locked and loading megathrust linked to active subduction beneath the Indo-Burman Ranges” on Nature Geoscience.com on July 11th. The paper says that “convergence of tectonic plates at the rate of 13-17 mm per year on an active, shallowly dipping and locked megathrust fault” will be the cause of a massive earthquake capable of displacing the ground from 5-30 metres. Such displacement may easily result in the soil rising 2 metres or more in height, which can even change the courses of our rivers. The last time this region had faced such a calamity was in 1787, when an earthquake had changed the river courses in Sirajganj.
The research paper shows that Bangladesh has a subduction zone exactly underneath it. Subductions zones are the boundary marks of collision between two of the earth’s tectonic plates. Tectonic plates are pieces of crust that slowly move across the planet’s surface over millions of years. The worst earthquakes in history have taken place around subduction zones, such as the Indian Ocean quake of 2004 and the Tōhoku earthquake of Japan in 2011. The most frightening fact about the subduction zone underneath us is that it is the first zone of its kind to be discovered under land. An immense area of 250-km below Dhaka has been sustaining stress without letting any of it up for about 400 years or more.
The questions stands, is Bangladesh ready for the incoming catastrophe? The Town Improvement Act (TI), 1953 was the first statute which recognized the need for “planning approach and created a special agency for development such as preparation of master plans, improvement schemes, their implementations” in Dhaka. After Bangladesh’s Liberation, the first building regulations came with the Bangladesh National Building Code (BNBC) of 1993. However, this century saw the boom of reckless and unplanned urbanization of Dhaka city, putting the citizen’s lives to risk in case of an earthquake. The citizens of Dhaka were awaken by an earthquake of 6.6 magnitude on January 4 around 5:00 AM. A wave of panic spread throughout the nation and shocking facts about the level of risk Dhaka citizens sustain came to light due to this earthquake. An article published by Daily Our Time on January 10 reads “72,000 buildings of Dhaka that have been recognized as unsafe and marked with red paint. RAJUK sources informs that 10 lakh people are currently living in these buildings. In the event of a mid-level or high-level earthquake, these buildings might collapse or develop cracks. Specialists have warned time and again against living in these buildings.” Most of these buildings were built without maintaining the regulations stated by the BNBC. An earthquake of 6.9 magnitude visited Dhaka on April 13, yet we do not see the government take measures before an earthquake hits as opposed to after the damage has already been done.
With the above mentioned facts being stated, it is obvious what the results of an 8.2-9 magnitude earthquake would be in Bangladesh. Professor Steckler told The Sydney Morning Herald that the buildings of Dhaka might just fall over instead of breaking as the soil would lose solidity. Colossal damage to the infrastructure would make it almost impossible to reach the people affected with emergency services, food and water. Professor Dr. Syed Humayun Akhter of the Geology Department of Dhaka University made a grim prediction. He said Dhaka could become “totally a dead city” and may even be abandoned in the aftermath of such an earthquake.
The ‘where’ of this earthquake has already been predicted, but the when cannot be determined just yet. Researchers opine it may take place anytime in the next 500 years, but it is up to us change our country into one that can survive a life-altering earthquake during this time-frame, one step at a time.