January 10-2014
A relatively mild quake registering 5.5 on the Richter scale struck Hormuzgan province on the Persian Gulf coast Thursday, killing one person, but flattening more than 800 homes, according to the Islamic Republic Housing Foundation.
The foundation said another 1,100 homes were damaged and needed repairs. Only 30 residents were reported injured in the quake, which struck an area of about 19,000 people.
The quake struck around Bastak at 6:43 a.m. when most residents were still in bed. In that sense, the death toll was remarkably low, especially if 800 homes were flattened.
But a 5.5 quake is really very mild. In fact, it is the weakest quake to cause any fatalities in Iran in the last decade.
The problem is the poor quality of much of the building construction in Iran. In August 2011, a quake of 5.8—more than twice the intensity of Sunday’s Bastak quake—struck Virginia and shook an area of a few million people. No one was killed or injured and no structures were flattened. The Washington Monument suffered cracking and some griffins were knocked off the National Cathedral in Washington, but that was about the extent of the damage beyond a lot of broken glass and cans knocked off shelves.
