The truth about the risk of super-earthquakes in Asia

After four strong seismic episodes within 48 hours in South Asia, Myanmar and Japan, the media warned of an imminent earthquake. How big is this risk?

Continuous earthquakes are not super disaster signs

Within a week, two strong earthquakes occurred in Japan and a series of other shocks in Myanmar, the Philippines . caused many losses of people and property. Soon after, Asians lived in fear when the media warned that this was just the beginning of an earthquake in the area soon after.

However, Inverse (USA) rejected this prediction. They argue that Asian media chaining earthquakes together and giving warnings is a too simple kind of thinking of non-geological people.

The earthquake in Kumamoto, Japan on April 16 caused much damage.(Photo: Tribktla).

According to the argument of Inverse: First , the recent Asian earthquakes have quite a moderate intensity. Specifically, there have been 36 earthquakes occurring across the planet since the beginning of 2016 and mostly occur in the Pacific fire belt - the area that suffers from the most earthquakes in the world. This is a normal phenomenon.

Second, earthquakes do not cause domino effect with a long distance. The shaking in any place on the earth does not cause earthquakes in places thousands of kilometers away. In most cases, each fault line operates independently, independent of or related to other fault lines. Therefore, successive earthquakes in Asia in the past short period cannot create a super seismic on the same continent.

Third , the larger the number of small earthquakes, the lower the risk of seismic. If light and moderate earthquakes occur consecutively on any fault line, they will reduce the risk of super seismic.

Finally , geological experts have not yet predicted exactly when seismic events will occur but can only assess their danger. They can track a fault line and calculate the energy accumulated therein when tectonic plates rub against each other. Later, they could make the judgment that if all the pressure below the fault line was released at the same time, an earthquake with some intensity would occur.

From the four arguments above, Inverse said that the statement "about to have an earthquake " because the sign from the recent earthquake is unfounded. However, this does not mean that such a big disaster will not happen in Asia.

The risk of super-earthquakes is real

Geologists warn, a strip of land on the western Himalayan slopes - in India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Afghanistan - could suffer earthquakes of up to 8 magnitudes due to compression between Indian tectonic plates. and Europe - Asia are increasing.

The Indian National Disaster Response Institute said that an equally devastating earthquake in a densely populated area - with cities built to low standards - could become a terrible disaster.

The strong earthquake in Nepal in 2015 and its aftershocks caused nearly 9,000 deaths due to the Indian tectonic plates moving north, into Central Asia at 67mm per year. But these seismic forces are still not large enough to release all the compression that is accumulating beneath the surface of the globe.

"The western part of the milling line (fault line) - which has never had any major earthquake in the last 500 years - can now create a violent seismic" - scientists predict.

Before the magnitude 7.8 earthquake occurred in Nepal in April 2015, many geologists hypothesized that a fault line across the Himalayas was about to create an earthquake.

Geologists are concentrating on the western region of the earthquake center in Nepal last year - where tectonic plates are still in a " unmovable " state . According to them, it is very likely that the 2015 earthquake did not disturb the hard part of the fault line below the Himalayas and west of the Kathmandu delta. Therefore, a slide of the tectonic plate can release pressure in the locked section of the fault line, enabling it to cause super seismic.

Roger Bilham - an earthquake researcher at the University of Colorado (USA) - said the following about the risk of super-earthquakes occurring in the Himalayas: "Under current conditions, at least 4 earthquakes with great intensity "More than 8 magnitudes may occur. The more these super earthquakes appear, the more energy accumulated for centuries will make them more intense."

According to the researchers, the most recent super-earthquake at the locked-down part of the Himalayas occurred in 1505. That fact made them believe that a similar event would happen in the near future.

The magnitude of the earthquake in 1505 remains a controversial topic. Some argue that the figure reached 8.5 richter, causing great damage to the Tibetan region.