What did it and why did you make a building in Bangkok’s collapse?

The main earthquake in Myanmar on Friday caused more than 1000 deaths and led to a collapse of multiple structures.

Although Myanmar is a high -risk region of earthquakes, buildings damage are widespread.

On the other hand, Bangkok is not considered predisposed to an earthquake. The Thai capital is more than 1000 km (621 miles) from the epicenter of the earthquake on Friday – and yet it is an unfinished building with a tall building in the city.

Here we will explain what caused this earthquake and how it is able to have such a powerful effect so far.

The upper layer of the earth is divided into different sections called tectonic plates, which all move constantly. Some move side by side, while others are above and below each other.

It is this movement that causes earthquakes and volcanoes.

Myanmar is considered one of the most geological “active” areas in the world because it sits at the top of the convergence of four of these tectonic plates – the Eurasian slab, the Indian slab, the Sunda slab and the Burma microplac.

The Himalayas are formed by the Indian slab, which has been confronted with the Eurasian slab, and the tsunami since 2004 as a result of the Indian plate moving below the microplap in Burma.

Dr. Rebecca Bell, a tectonics reader at Imperial College London, said that in order to accommodate all this movement, the mistakes -cracks in the rock -that allow the tectonic plates to “break” away.

There is a basic guilt called the saga fault, which is cut right through Myanmar north to south and is more than 1200 km long (746 miles).

Early data suggest that the movement that caused the earthquake on Friday on Friday was a “slip”-where two blocks move horizontally one by one.

This is aligned with the movement characteristic of the saga fault.

As the plates move one past the other, they can be stuck, building friction until it is freed suddenly and the ground is shifting, causing an earthquake.

Earthquakes can occur up to 700 km (435 miles) below the surface. This one was only 10 km from the surface, making it very shallow. This increases the amount of shaking on the surface.

The earthquake was also very large – measuring 7.7 on a momentary scale. It produces more energy than the atomic bomb that has fallen on Hiroshima, according to US geological studies.

The size of the earthquake was because of the type of guilt, said Dr. Bel.

“Right nature (guilt) means that earthquakes can be torn into large areas -and the greater the area of ​​the fault, which slides, the more the earthquake is,” she explained.

“There have been six magnitude 7 or more earthquakes in the last century.”

This right damage also means that much of the energy can be carried along its length – which extends 1200 km south to Thailand.

How to feel surface earthquakes are also determined by the type of soil.

In soft soil – which is built in Bangkok – seismic waves (vibrations of the earth) are delayed and accumulated, becoming more and more in size.

Thus, Bangkok’s geology would make the Earth shake more intensively.

While dramatic footage of tall buildings in Bangkok appeared, swinging during the earthquake – knocking water from the pools on the roof – The unfinished headquarters of the General Office of the auditor in the Chatukhak area in Bangkok seems to be the only skyscraper to collapse.

Prior to 2009, Bangkok did not have a comprehensive safety standard for the construction of buildings to withstand earthquakes, according to Dr. Christian Malog-Chukipipe, a senior earthquake teacher at Imperial College London.

This means that the older buildings would be particularly vulnerable.

This is not uncommon, as earthquake-resistant buildings can be more expensive to build Thailand, unlike Myanmar, often does not experience earthquakes.

Dr. Emily SO, a professor of architectural engineering at the University of Cambridge, noted that the older buildings can and are enhanced, such as in California, West Canada and New Zealand.

Still, the building that collapsed was new – in fact it was still being built when the earthquake was struck – and the updated standards for buildings would be applied.

But after studying the video, Dr. Malog-Chukipipe said that it seems that the construction process of a “flat plate” is preferred to be recommended in the areas prone to the earthquake.

“Flat plate” is a way to build buildings where the floors are made to rest directly on columns without using beams, “he explained.

“Imagine a table supported only by the legs, without additional horizontal supports below.

“While this design has costs and architectural advantages, it is poorly presented during earthquakes, often fails in a fragile and sudden (almost explosive) way.”

Mandalay in Myanmar was much closer to the place where the Earth slipped and would have experienced a much more shaking than Bangkok.

Although Myanmar is regularly experiencing earthquakes, Dr. Ian Watkinson, a land teacher at Royal Holloway University, believes that many buildings are unlikely to be built as an earthquake.

“Common poverty, major political cataclysms, along with other disasters – eg Tsunami of the Indian Ocean in 2004 – dispels the country from the concentration of unpredictable risks of earthquakes,” he said.

“This means that in many cases, buildings design codes do not apply and construction occurs in areas that could be prone to increased seismic risk, such as flooded planes and steep slopes.”

Parts of Mandalay and its buildings also lie along the Ayevadi River Bay. This makes them very vulnerable to a process called liquefaction.

This happens when the soil is high in water and the shaking causes the sludge to lose its strength and behave like a liquid. This increases the risk of collapse and collapse of buildings, as the Earth can no longer hold them.

So it warned that there was always a “chance” of more damage to buildings near the Razlum line due to the afters -tremor that follow an earthquake, which can be caused by a sudden transfer of energy to a nearby rock.

“Most of the time, the afteralds are smaller than the main shock and tend to reduce in size and frequency over time,” she said.

Additional reporting by Vicky Wong