Nepal earthquakes: 2015-16

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The Nepal earthquake: The places worst affected, and the extent of damage as seen on Day 5. The Times of India
The impact of the quake on climbers at Mt Everest and Mt Lhotse. The Times of India
The situation near Mt Everest on the 3rd day. The Times of India
Tourists in Nepal rescued by Day 5 (28 April)
The Nepal earthquake: The tectonic aspect The Times of India
Aftershocks and after-effects. The Times of India

This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content.

Contents

The authors of this article include…

The Times of India

The Times of India

The Times of India

The Times of India

PTI Apr 29 2015

The Times of India

Himanshi Dhawan The Times of India

The Times of India

The Times of India Deeptiman Tiwary

Briefly

A massive 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit Nepal with devastating force less than 50 miles from the capital, Kathmandu, causing tremors in northern India as well, on 25 April 2015. It killed thousands of people in Nepal and some in neighbouring India and Tibet.

11 districts, especially Sindhupalchok and Gorkha, were the worst hit.

Massive tremors were felt in Delhi, Lucknow, Kolkata, Silchar and other parts of northern and NE India. The quake in Delhi measured 5 on Richter scale.

A timeline

Day 1

The earthquake slid India up to 10 feet northwards in a matter of seconds, causing enormous damage, the gravity of which would emerge over the next many days.

Prime Minister Koirala, who was in Indonesia when the earthquake struck, learned about the earthquake from Indian PM Narendra Modi's tweet. Mr Koirala called Mr Modi to say that his tweet was his first source of information on the earthquake.

Mr Koirala immediately started preparing to return home.

Day 2

Mr Koirala reached Nepal and held an all party meeting in which he said that his government was sending desperately needed tents, water and food supplies to those in need

Nepal scrambled to organize quake relief, as many fled the capital

Hundreds were cremated near the Pashupatinath temple

Social media appeared to have beaten the traditional media with governments, various agencies and individuals using Twitter and Facebook to connect, rescue and provide relief.

Day 3

There were fresh tremors in Nepal, and people vacated buildings

The rains couldn't have come at a worse time for the thousands of people in Kathmandu waiting in the open for news from hospitals about the wounded and dying. As passengers shivered in temperatures that were brought down by the rain to about 13 degrees Celsius, there were no taxis to take them either home or to the hotel.

At the Tribhuvan International Airport at about 9pm, hundreds of Indians had gathered outside the terminus, wet and hungry. They would probably spend the night standing, pushing and shoving each other for a centimeter more space on earth that kept shaking through most part of Day 2. Inside the airport, guards sat forlornly as passengers could get neither food nor water. "Everything is shut, everything is dead," said a policeman.

A little beyond, at Baluwatar, near the Bhat Bhateni super market in the heart of the city, most residents had left their houses and were sleeping in a community centre. Young men stood guard, to warm them in the event of fresh tremors and to drive away thieves.

Day 4

Heavy rainfall raised fear of epidemic outbreak in quake-hit Nepal

Nepal was short on everything — shelter, fuel, food, medicine

The Nepalese PM, Mr Sushil Koirala, said that rescue operations were not effective. PM Koirala declared three days of national mourning. India had already done so.

In solidarity with its brethren in Nepal, the Government of India had declared national mourning and cancellation of all official entertainment on Day 2 itself.

Day 5

250 people were reported missing after a fresh mudslide in Ghodatabela village in Rasuwa district, a popular trekking area

Prices for essential foodstuffs soared. A pack of powdered milk is going for Rs 400 although it has Rs 212 printed as the MRP. Some taxi drivers asked for Rs 5,000 from the airport to Thamel, a Rs 800-ride in normal times.

The home ministry has threatened “strong“ action against those involved in fleecing an already desperate people.

There was an exodus out of the capital. On Day 4, around 80,000 left, in a single day.

The quake shook the faith of some, but turn lucky survivors into believers overnight

Day 6

With initial rescue efforts focused on Kathmandu, many villages were without food and drinking water. Desperate, they survived on raw crops standing in their fields.

Villagers in many parts of Barpak and Gurkha regions -the quake's epicentre -which are completely cut off started dying a slow death. Quake induced landslides had wiped out long stretches of roads and most villages had no space for helicopters to land.

In these villages, there was no rescue, only relief effort. Indian Air Force choppers hovered over the villages. Several attempts were made to land as villagers looked up in desperate expectation, but the chopper simply could not land. It finally just dropped food, tents and blankets and flew off.

The toll, the damage

On Day 4, Nepalese PM Sushil Koirala put the human toll at 10,000.

And, unfortunately, counting.

The PM’s round figure was obviously an estimate that included the ‘missing-and-out-of-contact, presumed dead.’ Even a day later, deaths confirmed by the Nepalese police stood at only half that number—at 5,045. The disaster also injured more than 10,000, the police said.

Though the largest number of casualties were reported from Kathmandu and Sindhupalchowk, the destruction in the Barpak-Gurkha region was massive. An aerial survey showed village after village flattened. All of Barpak’s 100-odd houses were completely flattened by the quake.

In the interiors of Nepal, where village after village was completely flattened, children suffered the most. With the earthquake striking during daytime, most adults were working in the fields, leaving their kids at home. As houses collapsed like packs of cards, the parents escaped without a scratch but their children either died or were badly injured.

Some 50,000 pregnant women were likely affected by the devastating earthquake in Nepal, a UN assessment said.

Eight million people have been affected by the devastating earthquake, the United Nations said on Day 4. More than 1.4 million need food, while water and shelter are also in short supply, the UN said in a report.Hundreds of people are still trapped under tonnes of rubble in capital Kathmandu and some of the worst-affected remote mountainous areas.

Indians in Nepal

A young Telugu film actor died in the Nepal earthquake. K. Vijay, 25, was in Nepal along with the unit of Telugu movie etakaram.com for shooting.

Then came the tragic news that eight members of a Hindi-Urdu film starring Mugdha Godse and Ruslan Mumtaz, too had died.

The worst-affected areas

Nepal earthquake: Two highways of death and destruction

The Times of India Keshav Pradhan,TNN | Apr 29, 2015

Steeped in religion, the temple city of Kathmandu has two major exit routes to the outside world --- Arniko Rajmarg for "godless" China and Tribhuvan Rajmarg for India, Nepal's religious soul mate. In the districts through which the two highways pass, [25 April 2015]'s earthquake was as devastating as it was in its epicentre, Lamjung, Gorkha and Kathmandu Valley.

Of the three districts that the China-built 110km Arniko Rajmarg cuts through to reach the Tibetan border town of Khasa, Sindhupalchok is worst-hit. The other two districts on the way to Tibet are Bhaktapur and Kavre.

Until now, Sindhupalchok, dominated by Tamangs who follow Buddhism, initially reported more than 1,021 deaths, higher than anywhere else.

"Sindhupalchok is a picture of massive devastation. The situation is equally worrisome in Gorkha, Dhading, Nuwakot, Rasuwa and Kavre. Our choppers are engaged in taking the injured to hospital," says Banwarilal Mittal, a Nepali of Rajasthani origin who owns an airline in Kathmandu. Speaking to TOI, he adds, "We have so far rescued about 600 people from Everest and Annapurna base camps, Langtang, Rasuwa, Dhading, Gorkha and Nuwakot districts."

Tatopani, Jalbire, Barhabise, Chautara, Pipaldanda and Melamchi are among the settlements in Sindhupalchok that have suffered the most. A large number of houses and government buildings have collapsed and landslides have damaged roads that run alongside the Bhote Kosi, a tributary of the Kosi.

A bridge named Miteri Sanghu (bridge of friendship in Nepal) over the Bhote Kosi joins Tatopani with Khasa. Reports say about 20 people have died in Tibet's Shigatse situated across the bridge.

Sindhupalchok, Kavre, Bhaktapur, Kathmandu, Lalitpur (Patan), Nuwakot, Gorkha, Rasuwa, and Lamjung are among the worst-hit districts. Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur (all major centres of Newar civilisation) have lost a significant number of ancient temples and heritage sites. Similarly, the historic Gorkha Durbar has also suffered damage.

To the south of Kathmandu, the districts through which Tribhuvan Rajmarg passes have suffered widespread damage. This Rajmarg joins Narayanghat-Mugling Highway in Dhading district, which in turn merges with the India-built Mahendra Rajmarg in the Terai bordering Bihar and UP.

Dhading, Makwanpur, Chitwan districts lying between the hills and the low lands, Bara and Parsa districts (dominated by Bhojpuri-speaking people) and Dhanusha and Saptari districts (inhabited by Maithili speakers) in the Terai, have witnessed significant loss of life and property.

World Heritage sites

The head of Unesco--the United Nations cultural agency—said that a preliminary assessment of the famed World Heritage site around Nepal's capital was a "huge disaster" after the weekend's earthquake. Three of the seven places of worship in the extensive site in and around Kathmandu had been severely damaged. Nepal's other World Heritage site, a natural park around Mount Everest, was also damaged.

In India Across the Terai in Bihar, 58 people died, most of them in the border districts of East Champaran, West Champaran, Sitamarhi, Sheohar, Supaul, Madhubani, Araria and Darbhanga

In Tibet China's official Xinhua News Agency reported 25 dead in Tibet

The Tectonic aspect

Part of India slid 1' to 10' under Nepal

`Part of India slid 1 foot to 10 feet under Nepal'

The Times of India Apr 29 2015

A part of India slid about one foot to 10 feet northwards and underneath Nepal in a matter of seconds during the devastating 7.9-magnitude earthquake that hit the neighbouring country on Saturday, a US scientist has said.

“Saturday's slip took place over an area about 1,000 to 2,000 square miles over a zone spanning the cities of Kathmandu and Pokhara in one direction, and almost the entire Himalaya mountain width in the other,“ said Colin Stark, Lamont Associate Research Professor at the LamontDoherty Earth Observatory , Columbia University .

“A part of India slid about one to 10 feet northwards and underneath Nepal in a matter of seconds,“ Stark said. “The rock (we call it the “crust“, or more precisely `lithosphere') below Bihar slid under Nepal along a zone from Bharatpur, through Hetauda, to Janakpur,“ Stark said.

“It's important to realize that all of northern India is sliding north under Nepal etc, all the time. The point is that the sliding takes place abruptly at different patches at different times,“ Stark said. It is known that the entire subcontinent is being driven slowly but surely underneath Nepal and Tibet at a speed of around 1.8 inches per year, Stark said.

Over millions of years, the squeezing has crushed the Himalayas like a concertina, raising mountains to heights of several miles and triggering earthquakes on a regular basis from Pakistan to Burma.

The earthquake was inevitable

Ancient collision made Nepal earthquake inevitable

KENNETH CHANG, The New York Times News Service | Apr 27, 2015

More than 25 million years ago, India, once a separate island on a quickly sliding piece of the Earth's crust, crashed into Asia. The two land masses are still colliding, pushed together at a speed of 1.5 to 2 inches a year. The forces have pushed up the highest mountains in the world, in the Himalayas, and have set off devastating earthquakes.

Experts had warned of the danger to the people of Katmandu for decades. The death toll in Nepal on [25 April 2015] was practically inevitable given the tectonics, the local geology that made the shaking worse and the lax construction of buildings that could not withstand the shaking.

Himalayan Nepal's earlier earthquakes

GeoHazards International, a nonprofit organization in Menlo Park, Calif., that tries to help poorer, more vulnerable regions like Nepal prepare for disasters, had noted that major earthquakes struck that region about every 75 years.

In 1934 — 81 years [before] — more than 10,000 people died in a magnitude 8.1 earthquake in eastern Nepal, about six miles south of Mount Everest. A smaller quake in 1988 with a magnitude of 6.8 killed more than 1,000 people.

Brian Tucker, president and founder of GeoHazards, said that in the 1990s, his organization predicted that if the 1934 quake were to happen again, 40,000 people would die because of migration to the city where tall, flimsily built buildings would collapse.

In an update [in April 2015], GeoHazards wrote, "With an annual population growth rate of 6.5 percent and one of the highest urban densities in the world, the 1.5 million people living in the Katmandu Valley were clearly facing a serious and growing earthquake risk."

The organization helped set up a local nonprofit to continue preparations, including the reinforcement of schools and hospitals.

[25 April's] earthquake occurred to the northwest of Katmandu at a relatively shallow depth, about nine miles, which caused greater shaking at the surface, but at magnitude 7.8, it released less energy than the 1934 quake.

Roger Bilham, a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado who has studied the history of earthquakes in that region, said that the shaking lasted one to two minutes, and the fault slipped about 10 feet along the rupture zone, which stretched 75 miles, passing under Katmandu.

The earthquake "translated the whole city southward by 10 feet," Dr. Bilham said.

Aftershocks as large as magnitude 6.6 have occurred mostly to the northeast of Katmandu.

It is possible that the [April 25] quake is a preface to an even larger one, but Dr. Bilham said that was unlikely.

Katmandu and the surrounding valley sit on an ancient dried-up lake bed, which contributed to the devastation. "Very, very soft soil, and the soft soil amplifies seismic motion," Dr. Tucker said.

Steep slopes in the area are also prone to avalanches like the one that the quake triggered on Mount Everest on [April 25, 2015].

Trekking, tourism, mountaineering

Everest base camp

A 30-member Indian Army climbing expedition turned into a rescue mission at the base camp of Mount Everest. The Indian soldiers who had gone to peak the highest summit in the world escaped by the skin of their teeth. They then started working to save lives on the harsh terrain and will be the last to leave.

Their sole doctor treated about 80 injured, including foreign climbers and sherpas. Around 10 of them had suffered head injuries

19 were killed on the slopes of Mount Everest.

Around 15 bodies were also recovered and three people are known to have succumbed to their injuries on their way down from base camp, which is at a height of 17,700 ft. One Indian soldier who suffered a minor injury.

When the 7.9-magnitude quake struck, the soldiers and accompanying sherpas were on an acclimatization trek to Khumbhu icefall, some 300 ft above base camp. The zone is infamous for its unstable ice blocks. An avalanche at the same spot had claimed the lives of 16 Nepalese guides exactly a year before. The soldiers survived as many as three avalanches at the icefall on 25 April 2015, with three jawans suffering minor injuries.

There were around 1,000 people in Everest camps when disaster struck. Nearly 80-90% were evacuated within five days.

The team decided that it would be the last people to leave the site, after every other climber and sherpa has been evacuated.

Tourism hit

Travel agencies said there was near 90% cancellation of bookings with [Indian] traffic being diverted to other hill stations and even south-east Asian countries.

Only people with families in Nepal requested for bookings to the country

Pokhara: Business as usual

According to the US Geological Survey, the epicentre was 4 km closer to Pokhara than to Kathmandu, large parts of which have been reduced to rubble. Pokhara sits 73km east of the epicentre of the April 2015 quake, but the only evidence of a disaster were a few cracked walls.

So, two days after the disaster foreigners milled around a scenic valley lake, shopped, ate at cafes and signed up in groups for their next sporting pursuit.

Boat trips and paragliding continued in this town, which had been spared the destruction wreaked elsewhere. Thousands of visitors flock to the picturesque destination every year, attracted by its scenic mountain views, clear, dry winters and abundance of adventure sports

Brotherly neighbours

India's "Operation Maitri" in Nepal, Graphic courtesy: The Times of India

India gave a massive thrust to its rescue and relief mission in quake-devastated Nepal - 'Operation Maitri' - pressing into service 12 heavy-duty military aircraft and 18 helicopters besides opening up four land routes to connect to Kathmandu and Pokhara valley to reach out to the affected with men and material.

The joint Army-Air Force operation managed to evacuate 5,400 people by the third day, including 30 foreigners, who were stuck in Nepal. India had received requests from several countries to rescue their stranded nationals. Accordingly, India evacuated 170 foreign nationals from Nepal by the 4th day.

After the third day of relief and rescue operations, congestion in Kathmandu airport had forced four of India's military aircraft to return due to non-availability of landing space. Of the 18 helicopters, six had been kept on standby.

The government had deployed 10 teams of the National Disaster Response Force, each comprising 45 well-equipped personnel trained in disaster rescue operations. Three more NDRF teams were rushed on the 3rd day.

On the 3rd day, Indian soldiers were able to reach parts of the worst-affected Pokhra region, the epicentre of the temblor, by helicopters and dropped relief material. The Indian Army set up a camp at the epicentre.

The first focus was to restore the power in Kathmandu and other parts of the Himalayan state with the help of a team of Power Grid officials. New Delhi also sent another team from Indian Oil to ensure continuous fuel supply.

Four land routes were opened to Kathmandu, removing the blockage on Sunauli-Bhairawah link. Other routes opened for road traffic include the Janakpur and Raxaul-Birganj routes in Bihar and Mahendra Nagar in Uttarakhand. At least 100 buses with relief material, including food packets, water, medicines and equipment were dispatched by the 3rd day.

The government has sent one RO plant for restoring drinking water supply and oxygen regenerators. Army personnel on the 3rd day reached interiors of the Himalayan country. While the main Taskforce Hq operated from Kathmandu, a sub-hq was set up at Barpak Village in Gorkha district, the epicentre of the quake.

An engineering task force, consisting of 40 soldiers, five earth-movers and generators, was by then operational 5-km outside Kathmandu. The Kathmandu-Pokhara road was restored.

Six choppers were inducted in Pokhara for rescue and relief operations with the rest operating in Kathmandu and surrounding areas. The Army immediately set up a field hospitals at Radalgrah, near Lalitpur. In addition the Air Force has airlifted a rapid aero-medical team. Two more teams consisting of 18 medical teams with surgeons, were set to follow

The Army deployed six ambulances while the Shashtra Seema Bal sent 10 more to the quake- affected areas. The home ministry asked SSB to assist in rescue efforts through India's land routes to Nepal. Supply of relief material was carried out through these land routes.

The government of India also launched a national disaster helpline -011-1078—for people to access information.

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