[lordnacho]

This is awful for people there.

I don't want to be rude about the 3rd world, but there are techniques for making structures that mitigate the effects of a quake. Of course there are impediments to implementing these things (economic, legal), but every time I hear about collapsed buildings and such I wonder how many people would have been saved. 7.9 is quite a lot though, and you'd expect deaths even in modern countries.

The other sad thing I've noticed is the death toll. No idea if this is actually true, but it feels like with 3rd world disasters, the estimate just keeps climbing every day. In the West it's often the other way (people don't come back to life, it's just that the initial estimates come down, for instance Sep 11 went from 50K to 3K).

[simonebrunozzi]

Third world?

In 2009, a "mild" earthquake (5.8 to 5.9 on Richter scale) hit L'Aquila, in the Italian region of Abruzzo [1]. I assume we all agree that Italy is a first world country.

Well, 308 people died, among which dozens of young kids in a school that has been built cheaply - the usual consequence of corruption. A real estate developer, hearing the news that an earthquake hit L'Aquila, LAUGHED on the phone with a colleague, happy for his new perspective business. [2] (note: Google Translate does a decent job, but when you read "Eagle" it means the city of L'Aquila).

The world is f&*ked up everywhere, not just in third world countries.

And sadly, no technology can fix human stupidity, amibition, and search for power and money.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_L%27Aquila_earthquake [2]: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...

[timr]

Indeed. There are a large number of structures in San Francisco that wouldn't withstand an earthquake of magnitude 7. The city just started a public shaming campaign to try to force property owners to come up to code, and you see the notices everywhere.

We've been lucky, but I expect that "the big one", when it hits here, will cause a lot of deaths from building collapse in older structures. I'm not really sure that the building I live in could handle a magnitude 7 quake...

[xzzx77]

I guess that is one way to get new housing built in SF.

[malkia]

Or the devastating hurricanes here in US....

[username223]

Yep. This was only 10 years ago:

http://api.ning.com/files/kV4MbYiv7oScbGCv5mKlo3mLFr-ZOY*T-U...

[coldtea]

>I don't want to be rude about the 3rd world, but there are techniques for making structures that mitigate the effects of a quake.

You're not rude, just ignorant. Those techniques need money. In these third world places people don't even have proper houses to live in, much less to withstand an earthuake.

>In the West it's often the other way (people don't come back to life, it's just that the initial estimates come down, for instance Sep 11 went from 50K to 3K).

It's just areas with huge population density. 7/10ths of the world live in the "third world". In comparison most of the USA, apart from NY and a few cities, is emptiness. But a similar disaster in San Francisco, for example, can still claim tens or hundrends of thousands for example.

[lordnacho]

>>I don't want to be rude about the 3rd world, but there are techniques for making structures that mitigate the effects of a quake. >You're not rude, just ignorant. Those techniques need money. In these third world places people don't even have proper houses to live in, much less to withstand an earthuake.

In the next sentence, I mention the economic impediments. You can interpret that how you like, but most educated, sensible people would say it covers the thought of "those techniques need money". Also, you might wonder how it is that these people who don't have houses to live in are found under piles of rubble.

[coldtea]

>Also, you might wonder how it is that these people who don't have houses to live in are found under piles of rubble.

You'll probably win few awards for sensitivity with those kind of comments. It's like wearing a paper hat that says "Upper/Middle class, privileged, knows shit about the world outside his home country, but insists on having an opinion" to people reading these.

What part about "not having PROPER houses to live" sounds contradictory to the rumble? Depending on the country, there's rumble that is from old buildings never repaired (e.g old colonial, or cheaply built concrete houses from better times), rumble from tin roofs in DIY shacks, etc... Here are what those houses looked in Haiti before the Earthquake for example:

https://www.google.gr/search?tbm=isch&q=haiti+houses+before+...

[baddox]

I don't think the commenter is ignorant. I think the lack of money is precisely what the commenter is talking about.

[wpietri]

I certainly read him as ignorant. He handwaves at the fact that poor people have less money than rich people. But it doesn't seem to have made much difference in his commentary.

As comparison, the world loses over 100,000 people each year to measles; the solution to that has been understood for decades, and deploying it is a lot easier than building to withstand a 7.9 earthquake.

The existence of techniques to fix a problem is not the only thing standing in the way to fixing a problem.

[coldtea]

He mentions "economic" as an inpediment in passing, still going on about why these people don't impement proper construction tecniques. It's like Maria Antoanete story, were she's told that the people can't afford bread and he says "well, why don't they eat cake then?".

Plus the way he talks about the "third world" this and that is borderline racist (and disrespectful).

[MPSimmons]

To be fair, even modern cities would have trouble with a 7.9. Maybe not tens of thousands of lives, but the scale is logarithmic, and in this quake, the amplitude was literally 10 times as strong as the 6.9 Loma Prieta quake in San Francisco during the 1989 World Series.

[jofer]

Closer to 30 times actually. Moment magnitude isn't base 10.

[will_work4tears]

To be fair though, he did say the amplitude (shaking apmlitude) was 10 times that of a 6.9, which is true, the energy released was 30+ times though, that is correct. (42+ PetaJoules vs 1.4 PJ in the case of the 6.9)

[jofer]

Actually, there's not a simple relationship between magnitude and intensity. Surface wave amplitude depends on a lot more than the size of the earthquake. (e.g. rupture depth, surficial geology, etc)

Moment magnitude is broadly calibrated to be similar to the old Richter scale, which was based (more or less) on log10 of the surface wave amplitude. However, the surface wave relationship only holds for mid-size earthquakes in southern California. It's different for larger earthquakes and different regions.

Either way, it is fair to say that the peak ground acceleration was not 30 times greater, and was significantly less (probably close to 10x, but could be a lot less or slightly more). It's not a simple relationship, at any rate.

[sanmon3186]

I come from himalayan seismic zone and disaster preparedness is rarely in anyone's priority. There are multiple factors. Massive old construction, awareness around seismic construction, life priorities vis-a-vis poverty and probability of disasters at this scale in one's lifetime (I have witness one major earthquake in 1986 that caused major structural damage but no casualties) are some of the factors that make things worse.

There is no doubt that right estimation can help in preparedness post disaster. There are theoretical models but IMO those come with lots of uncertainties. 9/11 example you quoted seems to be off by factor of ~17.

[joosters]

I hate the body counts in disaster news coverage. Why do we spend so long speculating on whether it is 10,000 dead or 15,000 dead? It doesn't matter to the vast majority of viewers, yet we get constant updates and speculation. It's just morbid. Even to those who have loved ones affected, the count is irrelevant. It's like we feel compelled to measure the awfulness of each disaster in order to rank and compare them. Please stop! (And if you put 'there are fears that the death toll could rise' in a news report, you are both padding out your story and revelling in the death counts. Again, just stop.)

[ssully]

I think it's just a way people can relate to a disaster. It's incredibly difficult to comprehend the damage of an event like this. Reducing it down to the number of lives lost, or money in damage adds context that people can understand. Though I will say even that is imperfect, because understanding what 1000+ lives lost actually means is pretty difficult.

Either way it's an imperfect solution, but one that can get a quick point across to people that this is a horrible situation.

[brudgers]

24 hour news stations just fill the dead air with whatever they can find. Speculation on body count is less absurd than covering how the story is trending on Twitter and comments posted on the news outlet website.

The spectacule of disaster is why people stay tuned in through pitches for Cialis and Hyundai and eTrade. News of disaster on the other side of the world is naught but infotainment after five minutes a day for anyone without a professional interest or actively working toward assistance.

Just turn off the TV.

[sanmon3186]

The count has some meaning for post disaster preparedness

[joosters]

Absolutely, but that count doesn't and won't be sourced from a 24 hour news channel, newspaper or shoddy news website.

Likewise, in the grand scheme of things, it is important to know the magnitude of the human cost of a disaster. But not anywhere near a minute-by-minute basis. ("We're hearing that the death count has risen to 12"... and so on).

[coldtea]

>I hate the body counts in disaster news coverage. Why do we spend so long speculating on whether it is 10,000 dead or 15,000 dead? It doesn't matter to the vast majority of viewers, yet we get constant updates and speculation.

Does the very disaster coverage matter to the vast majority of viewers?

[cossatot]

In general, natural hazards losses are measured in dollars in developed nations and lives in developing ones. But you're right, a 7.9 is huge. Even under southern California it would be devastating (see [1] for an idea based on the 1857 Fort Tejon quake). Nepal has had a lot of aid from Western nations to build more earthquake-resistant structures. But a big part of the problem isn't the structures themselves, it's the location of the building (the slope, substrate, and so forth). The options for ideal locations in much of Nepal are very limited because of the terrain. People also live where they do because they have for thousands of years, vs. the US where population densities are lower and we have built our cities more recently, looking for areas that suit modern techniques. North/central Europe doesn't have the exposure to earthquakes but Italy has problems with this; see L'Aquila for an example of the damage caused by very moderate seismicity.

The most recent analogous earthquake to this would be the 2008 Wenchuan, China earthquake: It was a very similar-sized earthquake, of somewhat similar type (it was reverse and strike-slip, while this is a thrust earthquake), and it occurred on a continental fault at similar depth, rather than a subduction zone where most of the shaking is offshore. It was a real killer, and a lot of the damage was caused by landsliding rather than actual ground shaking [2]. I fear this could be a big problem here. The Himalaya are eroding very rapidly, and are very prone to landslides anyways. I am not sure about the effects of mountain agriculture but I would assume that the clearing, irrigation and terracing that is necessary for the Nepalese to live in the mountains makes the hazards worse by stripping the plant roots and saturating the soil with water (wet soil/rock is more prone to landslides).

The Himalaya (esp. Bhutan[3]) also has a lot of lakes where glacial sediments have dammed creeks very high up in the mountains, and a huge concern is the failure of the dams during even moderate seismicity; this could cause huge, scouring floods to rip through villages.

I think the upside of this is that it is 'only' a Mw 7.9. Many of us in the active tectonics community have been very worries about the possibility of an 8.5-9 earthquake on the Main Himalayan Thrust; there is some evidence for this in the past, based on the length and size of old earthquake scarps at the Himalayan rangefront, and by analogy to other convergent plate margins. It is much, much better if the accumulated seismic energy is released in smaller amounts like more frequent 7.9s than a less frequent 9 (an earthquake of this size would basically rupture the Himalayan front from Assam to Dehradun).

[1]: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/shakemap/sc/shake/185... [2]: http://landslides.usgs.gov/learn/photos/international/landsl... [3]: http://www.nlcap.net/fileadmin/NCAP/Resources/Bhutan_present...

[alexholehouse]

This is such a morbid topic that I've never acted on it, but I suspect that with historical news data you could figure out the growth rate laws which relate time since disaster occurred with number of reported casualties to build a predictive model which - given the inaccessibility and population density of region and the scale of a disaster - would fairly accurately predict the final number of dead.

The logic being that irrespective of final number of dead the 'effective death rate' (i.e. number of new reported casualties per day) is likely to be similar (conjecture).

Anyway - just writing this post makes me feel uncomfortable, hence why I've never done more than hypothesize.

[GCA10]

Actually, if you gathered all that data, your sample would split pretty quickly into

a) tightly controlled societies (some = totalitarian) where the government has a strong interest in keeping the official number low, and

b) open societies (some with a sensationalist media culture), where news outlets gain the most attention by quoting the "experts" with the highest initial counts.

I submit the 1948 Ashgabat earthquake in what was then the Soviet Union and is now Turkmenistan. Initial reports from Tass (the USSR news agency of the time) talked of a relatively modest 6,000 injuries and 600 children orphaned, without providing an actual death toll. More modern estimates say that 110,000 to 176,000 people died.

By contrast, Japan's earthquake/tsunami of 2011 produced estimates of as many as 18,000 deaths in the weeks immediately after the disaster. The official tally now stands at a lower 15,890.

[RogerL]

The majority of the buildings that fell are historic sites and world heritage sites (source: cnn broadcast audio, so no link). They were built before we had such knowledge.

[rprameshwor]

When people have hard time fulfilling their very basic need of food and clothing, we can't expect them to invest more to make their houses earthquake proof.

[userbinator]

The initial estimate of the magnitude certainly went down - the page now says 7.8.

[marincounty]

Every multi-millionaire who used the indigenous people of that country in order climb the highest mountain(and all the other peaks), in order to check off another accomplishment should be on a private jet(if possible)--filled with doctors, medicine, water, food, and wads of cash.

Give money and support to every needy person. You might get a better "rush" out of the experience of really helping the needy; Rather than the narcisstic act of climbing mountians with help of poor people? (I don't know the state of Nepal's Red Cross? It might be a very efficient chapter? I don't trust money sent to government officials will reach the needy, but I might be way off?)

[ptaipale]

I disagree with most of this. Giving cash is probably good, but do it via established, organized structures like the Red Cross.

Well-meaning individuals in private jets bringing stuff is probably something that is going to make rescue work harder, not helping. To start with the logistics, any private jets would just overburden the local flight control system that will now be under stress, and there are not going to be much free parking places for jets in Kathmandu airport. And remember, it's not a big airport to begin with.

People may be frustrated by authorities in third-world countries who may be somewhat inept, but still, uncoordinated attempts to help are probably counter-productive.

And grudging about multi-millionaires who used the indigenous people of that country in order climb the highest mountain is also not useful. They were probably helping the country in the best way anyone can, even if they were seeking personal thrills: servicing climber tourists is one of the main export industries of countries like Nepal. The customers are mostly decent people even if they are rich, and they are (mostly) not doing anything bad, they are employing people and giving them a contact to the rest of the world.

(Not any personal expert on Nepal, but have a couple of friends who have stayed in the country in various development aid roles for a year or two.)

[hluska]

Are you talking about Sherpas?? If so, I have two facts to interject:

- Their capital (Namche Bazaar) is the most prosperous part of Nepal.

- Of the estimated £7m left in Nepal during a climbing season, about £2.4m goes to the government. During their strike in 2014, a prevailing feeling amongst the Sherpa was that the government takes but does not give. Their offer of an ~£200 settlement per dead Sherpa was seen as especially insulting.

[briandear]

Have you ever been to the Khumbu? Or even Nepal? Reading a Krakauer book or some clickbait Outside article doesn't make you any expert or give you any sort of authority on the subject.

First of all, the class envy nonsense is childish. What right do you have to begrudge others' success? Are you jealous? Do you give away all of your money? Based on your screen name it would seem that you have some connection to Marin County; one of the richest counties in the country. Unless you're living under a bridge, that would imply that you have some money. How much did you send to Nepal today? How much did you send to Bay Area homeless shelters? How many hours have you volunteered? I'm willing to bet almost zero -- because you'd prefer to spend and criticize other people's money. You're the kind of person that would call for tax increases "on the rich," while you yourself give not a single cent of your own money to charity. I don't know a thing about you, nor would I want to, but based on your insensitive and ignorant comment, I think we can draw some fairly accurate conclusions.

Secondly, Everest and the Himalaya is not the domain of millionaires. There are some millionaires that go there, for sure, but most Everest expedition members are middle class people who have saved for years and years as well as trained for years and years for a shot at Everest. People like you would love to spend $80+K on a Tesla or spend $500K on a closet-sized Bay Area condo. These people choose to spend $45K on a potentially once in a lifetime climb.

Do you know a single person who has climbed or attempted Everest? Nearly certainly not. There are some fools and bad apples for sure -- but you find fools and bad apples at Whole Foods or the local Fair Trade Shade Grown Coffee Establishment, Inc. as well. Perhaps you ought to get out of your shell of bitterness and head to the Himalaya yourself. Perhaps you'd find the same joy that others seek, perhaps you'd understand that climbing a mountain isn't any more narcissistic than creating a startup or even working at one.

Perhaps you might even find some spiritual comfort. Himalayan climbing, for many people, is probably the closest one can get to God (or the gods, etc.) while still being upon the Earth; to minimize or insult the climbers who seek that for themselves could be compared to criticizing Muslims over the Hadj. Every climber on Everest participates in a Puja before setting foot on the mountain, showing respect to the mountain. When was the last time you showed respect for anything? Who are you to minimize the goals and dreams of people just because you don't like what you assume to be their motivation?

Now, let's address the "millionaires ought to send cash" malarky. Have you ever heard of the Sir Edmund Hillary Foundation? Have you visited any of the dozens of schools, hospitals or community centers in the Khumbu region paid for by those millionaires you despise? How about the Himalayan Trust? The Alex Lowe Charitable Foundation? The Juniper Fund? The Sherpa Support Fund? The International Avalanche Nest Egg Fund? ..and countless others.

As far as those "poor" people that those evil millionaires exploit to climb the Himalaya. Do you know how much they're paid? Do you know that many climbing Sherpas have made enough money to even start their own companies, open hotels and send their kids to good universities? Sherpa aren't considered "highly paid" by western standards, but they are extremely high paid by Nepali standards.

Perhaps spend a few minutes researching and reading something other than Outside magazine or the other sensationalist nonsense about Everest, perhaps you'd gain a deeper understanding of what actually happens over there. Better yet, buy a ticket and go see (and volunteer) for yourself. Maybe go read Alan Arnette's blog and get educated about Everest from a source other than ones that are trying to sell clicks or copies.

[dang]

> Perhaps spend a few minutes researching and reading something other than Outside magazine or the other sensationalist nonsense

Please stop treating other commenters like this on HN. It breaks the rules and mars your otherwise substantive comments, no matter how wrong the other person is.