How Can We Reduce the Impact of Tectonic Hazards?

Where is My Location? The contient of my location is Asia. The country I`am talking about is Japan. The Japanese city is called Kobe. One of the biggest and highly populated cities on the western side of Japan close to Osaka. This region is known as Kansai.

What had happened to Kobe On 17th January,1995 at 5:46 Japan Time an 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit Kobe. This disaster killed 6.434 people and left 300.000 people homeless. Kobe was only 20 kilometers from the epicenter. Nearly every fifth building was destroyed. A double level highway collapsed over more than one kilometer and the horizontal displacement lengthen the newly build Akashi kaikyo bridge be one meter.

Densely built residential district

Damage at Minatogawa, Kobe

What Social and economic impacts had this disaster Kobe was not prepared for this kind of earthquake. For days the life came to an standstill. Transport, electricity and rail services were interrupted for days. The damage was even listed in the Guinness Book of Records with nearly 103 billion Dollar. Even after 14 years Japan has not be able to recover from this natural calamity.

Have there been any Natural Hazards before Have there been any Natural Hazards before? And what is the probabillty of a Natural Hazards occuring again? Even so Kobe is futher away from the dangerous intersection of the three tectonic plates, the Parcific, Euraisn and the Philippine plate. The subduction fault had already caused two major Earthquakes in 1944 and 1946. Kobe will probabliy be hit by another Earthquake in the near future because an Earthquake fault line runs directly below the city Kobe. Kobe

Are there any Plate Boundary in this Area. If Yes what type Are there any Plate Boundary in this Area? If Yes what type? What Natural Hazards Occur in this Area? In this Area there is one Plate Boundary. It is the Philippine Plate and the Eurasian Plate. This type is called Destructive margin. When ocean and contient plate meet each other the denser plate, in this case the ocean plate,goes down and the contient plate stays .When this happens it forms a big trench. In this Area most Earthquakes occur in the range from 0 to 100 km of Depth.

The 1995 fault scarp in Kobe

Map of Earthquakes in Japan

What is climate like in this area? What is the prediction in the future? Kobe Temperatures range from 2 to 31 Celsius and are expected to rise. Anyhow there is not a know link between the climate and earthquakes as of now.

How developed is the civilization in my location How developed is the civilization in my location? What types of Buildings? Farms,Houses etc Kobe is an highly developed industrial city. It has state of the art high rise buildings, state of the art express ways, one of the most advanced rail way system and the longest suspension bridge in the world. As you can see on the following pictures Kobe is an modern twenty first century city. Kobe has a well functioning ecosystem. This system provides food, fiber, water, energy and air.

View over the modern Kobe

Akashi – Kaikyo - Bridge

What has Kobe learned and installed after 1995 More Water Hydrants Wider Streets Earthquake Preparation Day Community Training Personal Preparedness Designated Emergency Roads Emergency Operating Center

Earthquake Preparation, Prediction and Protection in Japan Early Warning Systems (even with an seismograph an Earthquake is very difficult to predict). Earthquake safe building codes/standards ( only for New Buildings possible) Call immediate for international disaster help ( the first three or four days are critical to survive for humans)

Earthquake Preparation, Prediction and Protection in Japan Train emergency services such as Police etc. Install independent energy, water and communication supply for Hospitals and Emergency services. Earthquake drills at school/business/government Japan became the world leader in earthquake engineering and technical research.

Bibliography 1 "Google Earth” "National Geographic" Magazine 25 November 2009 No Edition Pacific Press Service/Alamy Page 1 http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/wallpaper/1995kobequake.html "Erdbebenursachen." “Lingen Lexikon.” Band 4 Berlin F.A. Brockhaus 1998 Page 137 BBC on this day No Author 1995: Earthquake devastates Kobe 17 January 1995 British Broadcasting Corporation 23 November 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/17/newsid_3375000/3375733.stm

Bibliography 2 Louie, J Earthquake Effects 25 November 2009 “Seismo”. 25 November 2009 http://www.seismo.unr.edu/ftp/pub/louie/class/100/effects-kobe-htm No Author Kobe Climate and Weather 24 November 2009 “World 66”. 24 November 2009 http://www.world66.com/asia/northeastasia/japan/honshu/kobe/lib/climate URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/kobe News Agent Reuter Death Toll Increases In Kobe Earthquake The Washington Post 4 Febuary, 1995 25 November, 2009 http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-819387.html

Bibliography 3 Waugh, David and Bushell, Tony Key Geography New Interactions CHELTENHAM, UK Nelson Thornes Ltd. 2002