Earthquake
There was an earthquake in Gujarat a few minutes before midnight, on the 7th of March. It seemed quite strong, judging by the fact that my table and computer were shaking a lot — and I wasn’t even in a tall building.
Predicting earthquakes is obviously a very hot topic amongst researchers today. Still, if we did learn enough about seismic activity to predict earthquakes, what could be done to minimize the damage? I don’t think it is practical to evacuate cities and towns when the alarm sounds. I suppose the ideal thing to do would be to build houses and other structures with some degree of resistance to earthquakes.
Maybe we could think of the earth below us as something similar to the ocean, that permits ships to float on it without any need for a foundation. Perhaps we could build structures without foundations? A pyramid, for instance, could probably remain stable without much external assistance. What’s more, relocation of a pyramid house would probably be quite simple — pick it up and put it somewhere else.
March 7th, 2006 at 20:31
Hope everything is alright there. I just talked to my parents and relatives and everything seems to be OK in Ahmedabad. As far as I know no casualties or significant damage have been reported.
I think even a few more seconds of advance warning will help people get out of buildings and move to safer areas. In countries like Japan they are continuously trying to improve their prediction techniques so that instead of 15 seconds of warning they can give (say) 30 seconds of warning. The 15 seconds might not seem much but in reality it makes a hell of a difference. Buildings should also be made at least somewhat earthquake-resistant…
The pyramid house seems like a very interesting idea but it does not scale well. It is possible to build small tent-like structures but anything bigger than a small house is not feasible. For e.g. how would you build a 3-storyed flat this way?
Btw this mention of pyramids reminded of geodesic domes ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geodesic_dome ) about which I had read a long time back. It makes for some very interesting reading.
March 14th, 2006 at 00:09
Yea I know it’s not officially spring break yet — but mine has started already! Since I’m taking only one class this semester and it happens to be on a Tuesday, my break has already commenced! And I end up getting almost two weeks of spring…