The seismically active zone of vrancea can provoke a powerful earthquake. earthquake in nepal

The April 25 earthquake in Nepal caused massive destruction, resulted in numerous deaths and triggered avalanches.

As a result of the devastating earthquake in Nepal, according to the latest data, more than 2 thousand people were killed, about 4 thousand were injured, RBC reports with reference to the BFM.tv channel.

Earlier it was reported that 1,910 people died in the earthquake.

The April 25 earthquake was the strongest in Nepal in 80 years, BBC Russian Service reports. Significant damage was reported - many buildings collapsed, the airport of the capital Kathmandu was closed, transport links were disrupted.

Powerful shocks were felt in India, Bangladesh and Tibet. Thus, in India, as a result intkbbee tremors caused by an earthquake in Nepal killed 20 people, four people - in Bangladesh, 12 - in Tibet, reports TASS.

Earthquake in Nepal 04/25/2015. VIDEO

The earthquake triggered avalanches on Mount Everest. Reuters, citing a spokesman for the Nepal Tourism Board, reports that an avalanche covered part of a climbing camp at the foot of Everest, killing 8 people.

According to the Russian Mountaineering Federation, a group of 15 Russian tourists who are in the mountains in Nepal affected by the earthquake, does not get in touch. Climber Alex Gavan wrote on his Twitter: "We were at the camp at the foot when the major earthquake. A huge avalanche followed. I jumped out of the tent to escape from her. Everything is fine with me. There are a lot of people at the top."

Nepal earthquake destroys Dharahara Tower

Footage taken at the time of the first shock in Kathmandu also appeared on the Internet.

The historical part of the Nepalese capital suffered more than others - entire temples lay in ruins. Kathmandu has lost one of its main attractions - the Dharahara observation tower. The building stood for 183 years. Two powerful earthquakes of the last century took one floor from her. Today, the elements have left only the foundation, Channel One reports.

According to eyewitnesses, hundreds of people, including foreigners, may be under the rubble. Among those who got into the camera lenses, there are many people with a European appearance.

The Ministry of Emergency Situations of Russia offered its help - our specialists are ready to fly out at any moment. However, according to recent reports, Kathmandu airport is closed - the runway is partially destroyed.

April 25 in Nepal happened. The epicenter of the earthquake was located 82 kilometers northwest of Kathmandu. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 15 kilometers. The earthquake killed 758 people in Kathmandu, as well as 7 people in India. On the same day, seismologists recorded 13 repeated earthquakes in Nepal. ranged from 4.6 to 6.6.

2015

April 25 in Nepal happened. The epicenter of the earthquake was located 82 kilometers northwest of Kathmandu. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 15 kilometers. The earthquake killed 758 people in Kathmandu, as well as 7 people in India. On the same day, seismologists recorded 13 repeated earthquakes in Nepal. ranged from 4.6 to 6.6.

On January 10, more than 1,500 people were affected by an earthquake with a magnitude of 5.0 in China. . The epicenter was located near the city of Artush, the focus lay at a depth of 10 kilometers.

2014

December 21 off the coast of the Indonesian island of Halmahera. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 54.6 kilometers.

December 8 off the coast of Panama, 8 kilometers southeast of the town of Punta de Burica. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 10 kilometers.

December 7 off the coast of Papua New Guinea. The epicenter of the earthquake was located 121 kilometers west of the city of Panguna, Bougainville Island. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 10 kilometers.

December 6 in southwest China in Yunnan province. As a result of the earthquake, one child died, 8 people received injuries of varying severity.

November 26 off the coast of Indonesia. The epicenter of the tremors was located 150 kilometers northeast of the island of Ternate, which is part of the Moluccas archipelago in eastern Indonesia. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 65 kilometers.

November 22 in Nagano Prefecture in Japan happened. The hearth lay at a depth of 10 kilometers. Most swipe fell on the villages of Hakuba, Ogawa and the city of Nagano. In just two days, about 100 repeated tremors with a force of up to 5 points were recorded in the region. 95 houses were completely or partially destroyed, 46 people were injured.

November 22 in southwest China in Sichuan was. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 18 kilometers in the city of Tagun. The earthquake was followed by another 95 seismic shocks of lesser intensity. In the city of Tagun, 60 people were injured, of which 42 were students elementary school. 5 people died.

November 21 off the coast of Indonesia. The earthquake was recorded in the area of ​​the Molluk Islands. The hearth lay at a depth of 10 kilometers.

10 people were injured. As a result of the earthquake, the movement of trains on the main railway lines of the island, traffic on high-speed highways was also suspended.

January 28 earthquake of magnitude 6.6. Its epicenter was located on the territory of Kazakhstan, 225 kilometers southeast of Alma-Ata, the focus was at a depth of 10 kilometers. As a result, more than 200 houses were destroyed in the border region of China.

January 5th, with a magnitude of 7.5, caused a local but potentially devastating tsunami.

The epicenter of the earthquake was located 106 kilometers west of the city of Craig. The source of the earthquake lay at a depth of 9.9 kilometers.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources

Photo Niranjan Shrestha/AP

2015 Nepal earthquake

On April 25, 2015, at 11:56 a.m., 85 km from the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, earthquakes of magnitude 7.8 occurred, as a result of which 8699 people died, and the earth's surface in the Kathmandu region rose by an average of 91 centimeters (according to the DLR German Aerospace Center ). The epicenter of the earthquake was located at a depth of about 15 km near the village of Barpak in the Gorkhka region, 85 km northwest of the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu (according to other sources, between the regions and). The settlements of Barpak and Larpak were completely destroyed. The wave of elements moved to the east, so the eastern regions of Nepal suffered more than the western ones. According to the National Seismological Center (Nepal), after the earthquake in Gorkha, as of December 18, 2017, Nepal experienced 488 aftershocks (more than 4 magnitudes) .

United Nations image (Nepal Information Platform)

Various groups of scientists announced that the earthquake in Nepal was reflected in the height of the Himalayan peaks. According to data received from the Sentinel-1A satellite, the height of Everest has decreased by 2.54 centimeters. However, scientists from the United States Environmental Protection Agency report that the highest peak of the planet fell by only 1-2 millimeters, while the Annapurna mountain range, on the contrary, rose by 20 centimeters as a result of the earthquake.

The image below shows data obtained by comparing images taken from the Sentinel-1A satellite before and after the earthquake. The blue color shows areas of uplift of the Earth's surface up to 0.8 m in the direction of the satellite ("line of sight"), which can be caused by vertical lift earth's crust at 1 m. in yellow shows areas of subsidence of the earth's surface down - a frequent occurrence during earthquakes, when oncoming traffic in the direction of the zone of rise of the earth's crust in subduction zones (where one plate sinks under another). In addition, a north-south horizontal displacement with an amplitude of up to 2 meters was found. The quake released tensions built up between the Indian and Eurasian plates (pictured showing plate boundaries), causing the earth's surface to shift violently.

Causes of earthquakes in Nepal

To understand the cause of earthquakes in Nepal, let's turn to its geology, which began to form about 90 million years ago, when the Indo-Malagasy plate split and part of it - the Indian plate - began to move towards the Eurasian plate. About 50-55 million years ago, the plates collided and the Indian plate began to sink under the Eurasian one, resulting in the formation of the Himalayas. Nepal is located in the collision zone, occupying the central sector of the Himalayan arc - almost a third of the Himalayan ridge with a length of 2400 km.

Image SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN

The Indian plate continues to move towards the Tibetan plateau at a rate of about 50 mm per year, which causes compression of the earth's crust and, as a result, the formation of a mountain range. Therefore, the Himalayas continue to grow. In 1999, scientists from the National Geographic Society of the United States, using GPS data, determined that the height of Everest is 8850 meters, which is 2 meters more than in the information obtained in the 19th century. The sinking factor of the Indian plate under the Eurasian one is the cause of devastating earthquakes.

Based on a study published in 2014 in the Journal of Geophysical Research, on average, the strongest earthquakes occur in eastern Nepal every 750 ± 140 and 870 ± 350 years. Further research showed that the earthquakes that occurred in Nepal in 1934 and in 2015 are interconnected by tectonic stress transfer - this corresponds to historical picture earthquakes. Prior to this, strong earthquakes occurred about 700 years ago.

Seismic risk map of Nepal

Picture of Digital Himalaya

Strong earthquakes in the history of Nepal

Here is what the National Seismological Center says:

The history of seismic activity in Nepal has been preserved in various written forms, including chronicles. They all play important role to assess seismic activity, since instrumental observations were not carried out until the 20th century.

An earthquake in 1255 destroyed numerous houses and temples and killed approximately one quarter to one third of the population of the Kathmandu valley. The magnitude of the earthquake is estimated at 10 out of 12 on the modern Mercalli scale (Chitrakar and Pandey, 1986).

What is known about the earthquake of 1408 is that it destroyed the Machendra Nath temple in Patan. With regard to the earthquakes of 1681 and 1810, only the fact that they occurred is also known, but the territories that they affected are unknown.

The latest study of the available historical data regarding the 1833 earthquake showed that it occurred 50 km north-northeast of Kathmandu, covered an area of ​​​​70 km, and its strength was approximately 7.8 magnitudes. Fewer than 500 people are reported to have died, which may be due to two small aftershocks that preceded the quake and "warned" people of the impending danger.

A series of earthquakes in Nepal, according to preliminary data, led to numerous casualties.

Tremors of magnitude up to 7.9 were felt hundreds of kilometers from the epicenter and led to destruction, including in India.

(UPD. 23:50) The number of victims of the earthquake in Nepal exceeded 1.5 thousand. It is reported by The Times of India with reference to the Minister of Information and Broadcasting of the country.

Related materials

The famous Russian musician and showman Valdis Pelsh, who is now in the Himalayas, on the northern Tibetan slope, told Ekho Moskvy that everything is in order with him and his comrades. They are not going to stop the filming process, despite the serious threat from the earthquake in Nepal. All the worst, according to Pelsh, is happening now on the southern side of the Himalayas, there is a heavy snow cover, avalanches and there may be victims. Valdis Pelsh posted two photos on his Facebook page:

An earthquake caught us at Rongbuk Monastery

The trail we walked 15 minutes ago.

The first reports of destruction and casualties came from the capital of Nepal, Kathmandu. Here, judging by the photographs and videos published by the media, many buildings are seriously damaged. In the center of the city, a monument of the 19th century, the observation tower of Dharahara, was destroyed. The epicenter of the most powerful shock was a couple of hundred kilometers northwest of Kathmandu, in these areas the elements leveled ancient temples, roads were destroyed, landslides and avalanches are known, including on Everest, where many climbers disappeared. The country is experiencing disruptions in mobile communications and Internet access, all flights have been canceled, and some areas have been cut off from electricity. All this makes it difficult to obtain information from the most affected settlements.

Nepal's ambassador to New Delhi, Deep Kumar Upudhay, said that the government of the republic has officially asked the Indian authorities for help in eliminating the consequences of the earthquake. The Russian embassy in Nepal is investigating whether there are Russians among the victims of a powerful earthquake in Kathmandu.

This earthquake occurred in an area where such phenomena are quite rare, but extremely destructive, Pyotr Shebalin, chief researcher at the Institute of Earthquake Prediction Theory and Mathematical Geophysics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Ekho Moskvy.

Eyewitnesses in Nepal report many destroyed buildings in the Kathmandu Valley, road failures, rock falls and landslides. There is information about possible damage to the runway of Kathmandu Airport, in connection with which its work has been temporarily stopped. In the capital of Nepal and in Pokhra, telephone communications were disrupted in many areas, electricity was interrupted, and several local fires were recorded.

Among the victims of the earthquake in Nepal may be the Russians. Russian diplomats and tour operators are unable to establish contact with several groups of climbers in the Himalayas. A powerful avalanche destroyed, in particular, the base camp on Everest. More than 20 Russians were at risk, according to the data cited by Irina Tyurina, representative of the Russian Union of Tourism Industry, in an interview with Ekho Moskvy. The largest missing group of Russians was led by the President of the Federation of Russian Mountaineers Andrey Volkov, they are experienced athletes. The organization said that they have already contacted, no one was hurt, the group decides how to proceed - to stay in Nepal or return home. Meanwhile, data on Russians after a series of earthquakes is being collected at the Russian embassy in Kathmandu. They say that so far there are no victims among those 20-25 people who contacted the diplomats. For compatriots, they organized a center for assistance at the diplomatic mission,” press attache Azret Botashov told our radio station.

According to TASS at the Russian Embassy in Kathmandu, there was no information about the injured Russians.

In connection with the earthquake in Nepal, the Russian Emergencies Ministry opened hotline. The department receives information from citizens about Russians who were or could be in the disaster zone.