CNN reporting nearly 1,500 dead. What a tragedy.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/25/asia/nepa ... index.html

Guardian live updates:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2 ... ve-updates

Sad stuff, but a reminder of the power of nature.

Photos:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/galler ... n-pictures

That's sad news.

Can you imagine what would happen if a 1.0 hit Phnom Penh and the cheaply built buildings there, or for that matter anywhere in Cambo? Most of the countries buildings would be in a rubble pile.

Sailorman wrote:Can you imagine what would happen if a 1.0 hit Phnom Penh and the cheaply built buildings there, or for that matter anywhere in Cambo? Most of the countries buildings would be in a rubble pile.

I think the building standards would only be a part of the problem. Because PP and like most of Cambodia is built '' on the skin of a rice pudding '', the shock waves would go back and forth like waves on a pond and with liquefaction of the soils many buildings would sink on their foundations.

Many people. Sad!

I guess if there is an earthquake strike phnom penh or any part of Cambodian, all the houses and building will be scattered around. Not to mention many people will die. In Cambodia, most of buildings were not built following the technical. Most of house and building owners are not willing to pay for civil engineer to calculate for them. Moreover, since our government is really corrupted, people just pay bribe and build whatever they want. In addition, in order to save the cost of the building, most Civil engineers didn't include the loads earthquake, snow and wind when they design. I guess most of civil engineers didn't want to do that, they actually wanted to include all the loads, but it required by the owner. They want the cost of the construct as low as possible. Cambodia doesn't have snow and earthquake, if only if keep continue this way.

It's quite possible (but admittedly unlikely) that Cambodia could have an earthquake in the future. Tectonic plates move all the time, and a strong enough and deep enough shift could change things, but it would have to be close to 10 on the Richter scale and near the western/southern edge of the closest plates, or east of and north of the Indonesian plate.
For many years academics and scientists in Thailand laughed at the idea of a tsunami affecting Thailand, then when it happened, they woke up.If it had hit the Bangkok side of Thailand, millions would have died, most of Bangkok is only around 2m above sea level.

one of my friends is in nepal, luckily shes still alive but shes where the earthquake hit