A group of Turkish academics and experts in engineering, geology and architecture has revealed the main reason why thousands of buildings collapsed after the 7.8 earthquake that struck southeastern Turkey on February 6 with its epicenter in Kahramanmaraş, and which has already caused 44,374 deaths. Their report, quoted by the Hürriyet newspaper, indicates that more than 160,000 buildings in the 11 affected provinces have been destroyed or have so severe damage that requires demolition; 97% of these buildings were built before the year 2000, when the construction legislation in Turkey was changed in the aftermath of the Great Marmara Earthquake of 1999.
Now, as happened in 1999, or as also happened in the Van earthquake of 2011, the construction of buildings without infill walls or with inadequate materials, among other factors, caused them to collapse like “pancakes”. By contrast, the vast majority of buildings built after 2000 have resisted, even as the combined force of the two 7.8 and 7.6 earthquakes in Kahramanmaraş unleashed a destructive energy that international experts have compared to the great earthquake that in 1906 destroyed the city of San Francisco, California.
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Pablo Gómez is a specialist in Turkey and has been editor-in-chief of Hispanatolia since 2011. He has been analysing current affairs and geopolitics in Turkey and the surrounding region since 2006.
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