Haitian 2021 Earthquake & Response

Sailor51

Happy to still be here
Oct 30, 2018
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Keep Calm and take a deep breathe.
It's going to be ok.
I have a lot of respect for mother nature
and the beauty she has blessed all of us
with.
I have zero respect for the folks who
work so tirelessly to destroy it.

Going forward I'll be sure to tiptoe around these sensitive issues whenever the topic leans towards the poor little Hatians.
We are all victims.
We all deserve better and an the end...
everyone, no matter how much damage they have done to this island, should all receive a trophy.
#haitianlivesmatter
#weareallvictims
#keepcalmandtakeadeepbreath
#pleasedontleaveus
[insert name here] matter. I'm really tired of seeing that. All lives matter or none do.
 

KyleMackey

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Apr 20, 2015
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I guess Hillary just head about this.
hillary-clinton-plane.gif
 

Kipling333

Bronze
Jan 12, 2010
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The sole reason that this dreadful earthquake occurred where it did is because there are two fault lines meeting in this area and these fault lines are not static but are moving a little all the time. If people took the time to do just a few hours research it would lead to better quality postings.
 

NALs

Economist by Profession
Jan 20, 2003
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I don't know of anything people can do with their behavior to make an area more prone to earthquakes. See below, some scientists say yes. BUT... Some people say, you get the government you deserve. So perhaps the lack of infrastructure, poor building code enforcement, deforestation, crime, drugs etc etc etc which causes these natural disasters to be more "disastrous" is in fact due to the actions of the people and THEIR government. I know there are people that still want to blame it on the French Repayment plan.... To that I say 😂 lol. There could be something in genetic code that makes some societies better able to govern themselves. Also a question for scientists, one brave enough to comment. I purposely used the words "perhaps" and "could" as I am posting for a friend, except for the lol part.

Haiti has a very good building codes, but most people don't follow them. The few that do are basically guaranteed that their house/building will not collapse or get damaged to become unsafe during a strong earthquake.

Look at Chile or Japan which are countries that get strong earthquakes quite regularly. You harfly ever hear thwt "the world is ending" in most of them, because most buildings are built according to code.

Look at this. It was in Chile during an earthquake stronger than the one that hit Haiti (8.4 vs 7.2) and people are calm as if nothing is happening.


Here is another video of the same earthquake in Chile. Chilean buildings are able to withstand strong earthquakes.


What kills people in an earthquake are buildings falling on them. Get rid of that danger and you cut loss of life by like 99%. The others probably have some personal event probably triggered by the earthquake such as a heart attack, but it isn't because the house fell on you.
 
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Big

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Apr 24, 2019
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hopefully the UN stays away. They killed another 10,000 people trying to help in the 2010 earth quake
 
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Luperon

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Jun 28, 2004
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Haiti has a very good building codes, but most people don't follow them. The few that do are basically guaranteed that their house/building will not collapse or get damaged to become unsafe during a strong earthquake.

Look at Chile or Japan which are countries that get strong earthquakes quite regularly. You harfly ever hear thwt "the world is ending" in most of them, because most buildings are built according to code.

Look at this. It was in Chile during an earthquake stronger than the one that hit Haiti (8.4 vs 7.2) and people are calm as if nothing is happening.


Here is another video of the same earthquake in Chile. Chilean buildings are able to withstand strong earthquakes.


What kills people in an earthquake are buildings falling on them. Get rid of that danger and you cut loss of life by like 99%. The others probably have some personal event probably triggered by the earthquake such as a heart attack, but it isn't because the house fell on you.

So true, but codes and laws without Enforcement don't work well.
 

Kipling333

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Jan 12, 2010
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The last earthquake in Japan killed more than 18000 people, and the one before that more than 6000. The last major earthquake in Chile had its epicentre more than 200 miles off coast . There are different types of earthquakes ,some destroying by constant vicious shaking and some by vertical or horizontal acceleration and we have seen videos of huge cracks opening up along roads faster than a man can run and others causing huge tsunamis as in SE Asia . Enormously strong dam walls and nuclear power stations have been severely damaged. With that background, it is very difficult to see how these poor Haitians can have any code that is totally earthquake proof .I have seen houses in earthquake cities predominantly made of timber,weatherboards thus keeping the house lightweight and Wellington is an example but these cities are not subject to the ferocious Caribbean hurricanes. If only warnings could be given to places when earthquakes are about to strike !! My prayers are with those who have been injured or have suffered from this tragedy.
 
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NanSanPedro

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The last earthquake in Japan killed more than 18000 people, and the one before that more than 6000. The last major earthquake in Chile had its epicentre more than 200 miles off coast . There are different types of earthquakes ,some destroying by constant vicious shaking and some by vertical or horizontal acceleration and we have seen videos of huge cracks opening up along roads faster than a man can run and others causing huge tsunamis as in SE Asia . Enormously strong dam walls and nuclear power stations have been severely damaged. With that background, it is very difficult to see how these poor Haitians can have any code that is totally earthquake proof .I have seen houses in earthquake cities predominantly made of timber,weatherboards thus keeping the house lightweight and Wellington is an example but these cities are not subject to the ferocious Caribbean hurricanes. If only warnings could be given to places when earthquakes are about to strike !! My prayers are with those who have been injured or have suffered from this tragedy.
They have the codes but no one follows them nor can they. People who subsist on $5/day can't be expected to care about building codes. Also, a sizeable percentage of people are squatters. They're not going to build a good structure on someone else's property.
 
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Lobo Tropical

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Aug 21, 2010
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Haiti has a very good building codes, but most people don't follow them. The few that do are basically guaranteed that their house/building will not collapse or get damaged to become unsafe during a strong earthquake.

Look at Chile or Japan which are countries that get strong earthquakes quite regularly. You harfly ever hear thwt "the world is ending" in most of them, because most buildings are built according to code.

Look at this. It was in Chile during an earthquake stronger than the one that hit Haiti (8.4 vs 7.2) and people are calm as if nothing is happening.


Here is another video of the same earthquake in Chile. Chilean buildings are able to withstand strong earthquakes.


What kills people in an earthquake are buildings falling on them. Get rid of that danger and you cut loss of life by like 99%. The others probably have some personal event probably triggered by the earthquake such as a heart attack, but it isn't because the house fell on you.
It's obvious that buildings that collapsed are old brick and mortar structures.
It would be no different in S.D. colonial zone with historical buildings.
Same in Mexico D.F.
Concrete with rebar or cinder bocks with rebar and concrete are obviously stronger and more resilient in earthquakes.
Same happens in the US hurricane States because of flimsy construction.
Were they to build accordingly, houses would not be flying away, but they never learned.

To get rid of the danger what are you going to do with historical buildings, including churches?
Asides from Haiti building codes, who in country has the money to build accordingly???
A failed State without resources.
 
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NALs

Economist by Profession
Jan 20, 2003
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It's obvious that buildings that collapsed are old brick and mortar structures.
It would be no different in S.D. colonial zone with historical buildings.
Same in Mexico D.F.
Concrete with rebar or cinder bocks with rebar and concrete are obviously stronger and more resilient in earthquakes.
Same happens in the US hurricane States because of flimsy construction.
Were they to build accordingly, houses would not be flying away, but they never learned.

To get rid of the danger what are you going to do with historical buildings, including churches?
Asides from Haiti building codes, who in country has the money to build accordingly???
A failed State without resources.
The reason there are is a colonial zone in SD and no other inland is precisely because SD isn't on a fault or near one. The earthquakes affecting SD has always been on the light side. Other places inland were closer to one, such as La Vega which was destroyed in the 16th century by an earthquake and it rivalled Santo Domingo (now Colonial Zone), including its cathedral which was as large as the Oldest Cathedral of the Americas in Santo Domingo and where Bsrtolomé de las Casas oficiated his first masd. The ruins of the original La Vega are still there and of other towns such as Santiago and Azua, and others.

If it wasn't for the earthquakes, the DR would have at least 10 colonial zones scattered throughout the country.
 

Lobo Tropical

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Aug 21, 2010
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The reason there are is a colonial zone in SD and no other inland is precisely because SD isn't on a fault or near one. The earthquakes affecting SD has always been on the light side. Other places inland were closer to one, such as La Vega which was destroyed in the 16th century by an earthquake and it rivalled Santo Domingo (now Colonial Zone), including its cathedral which was as large as the Oldest Cathedral of the Americas in Santo Domingo and where Bsrtolomé de las Casas oficiated his first masd. The ruins of the original La Vega are still there and of other towns such as Santiago and Azua, and others.

If it wasn't for the earthquakes, the DR would have at least 10 colonial zones scattered throughout the country.
It would be great to have Taino people and all colonial buildings.
Let's hope for no major catastrophes in the DR.

Map of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic ...
Gon%C3%A2ve_microplate.png


 

Lobo Tropical

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Aug 21, 2010
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Perhaps they would have better fortune if they started behaving like civilized people.

It's about time that dr1 owners and moderators take down trash posts like this and delete the posters account.
Take some responsibility for your websites content, unless you want it to turn to trash.

By now there are 1300 people dead and surely many more to be counted.
Not to mention injured, lack of medical treatment and more devastation for Haiti.

dr1 has lost many valuable posters because of extreme positions allowed here.
I'm embarrassed for you guys.
 

NALs

Economist by Profession
Jan 20, 2003
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It would be great to have Taino people and all colonial buildings.
Let's hope for no major catastrophes in the DR.

Map of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic ...
Gon%C3%A2ve_microplate.png


It would be great, but most of the colonial buildings are in Santo Domingo for reasons already explained. There were colonial buildings in other places, such as El Salvador, but strong earthquakes destroyed all of them and now not even San Salvador has an equivalent of a Colonial Zone.

The DR is the one that gets hit with major earthquakes more often than Haiti. Dominicans are aware there are major earthquakes that strike the DR for several reasons including ruins from earthquakes throughout much of the country and that the ground shakes constantly throughout the year. The ones that usually are “not in the know” are some expats who are relatively recent arrivals. I remember when the major earthquake struck near Puerto Plata in 2003 and in an earthquake thread here on DR1 someone posted “who knew?” Now that’s a question no Dominican would make! There wasn’t major international coverage of that earthquake, despite some buildings collapsed along the north coast and infrastructural damage was seen in places like Santiago and Moca. There was also some losx of life, but all in all affected buildings, rosds, and people killed was on the minimal side even though it was the strongest earthquake to hit the island at that time. Before that I think the strongest was the one in the 1940’s off the coast of Nagua.

When the 2010 earthquake hit Haiti there were several Dominican engineers that went on TV and commented that Haiti has a very good construction code, so the worry wasn’t the collapsed of homes belonging to rich people because those are usually built according to code. Many even use US building code, which are among the strongest in the world regarding earthquake damage, especially after the 1994 earthquake that hit Los Angeles. But Haiti’s construction code basically mirrors the USA. It is the poor Haitians that tend to ignore the buiding codes and, in fact, none of the houses of the rich collapsed, but many poor folks were killed when their homes fell on them.

I don’t see what the Tainos have anything to do with this topic, but it’s precisely in the DR and PR where Taino DNA exist the most today, judging by DNA results. Elsewhere in the Caribbean not so much, despite Taino peoples inhabited all of them (other peoples such as the Caribs genetically were the same as the Taino’s). A similar patter is seen with Mitochondrial DNA where the highest occurrence is precisely the DR while in PR most of the people have a Taino mitochondrial DNA. When it comes to Haiti Taino DNA and Taino mitochondrial DNA practically doesn’t exist, similar to the rest of the Caribbean.

These are two studies regarding the existence of Taino DNA in today’s Dominicans, but all genetic studies show that. In fact, the common denominator is that Amerindian DNA is the greatest in countries that were part of the Spanish Empire, whether it’s in the Caribbean where the highest are seen in former Spanish Empire territories or in Mexico, Central, and South America. This contrast sharply with what’s seen in parts that use to belong to the British, the French, etc empires. Even on Hispaniola there is a marked difference regarding this between Dominicans and Haitians, the latter not only having mostly African DNA, but also African paternal and maternal lineages and the virtual absense of Taino lineages, unlike Dominicans.

1-s2.0-S0960982219313065-gr1.jpg


pgen.1003925.g003.PNG_M

 
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NanSanPedro

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@NALs: It's interesting what you say about the building codes because the presidential palace was totally trashed in the 2010 earthquake. I did look it up and the article on wiki says that the one the earthquake destroyed was completed in 1920. I'm sure the building codes weren't the same back then.
 
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windeguy

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The reason there are is a colonial zone in SD and no other inland is precisely because SD isn't on a fault or near one. The earthquakes affecting SD has always been on the light side. Other places inland were closer to one, such as La Vega which was destroyed in the 16th century by an earthquake and it rivalled Santo Domingo (now Colonial Zone), including its cathedral which was as large as the Oldest Cathedral of the Americas in Santo Domingo and where Bsrtolomé de las Casas oficiated his first masd. The ruins of the original La Vega are still there and of other towns such as Santiago and Azua, and others.

If it wasn't for the earthquakes, the DR would have at least 10 colonial zones scattered throughout the country.
You pointed out the one and only good thing about Santo Domingo. 😇

I have a friend in Santiago, Chile who was in his condo in a tall building during a MAJOR earthquake there. One that probably would have leveled my house which suffered no damage in the 2003 earthquake in the POP area. The construction was so good in Chile that there were very few problems anywhere in the region, including his building. He assured me it was very intense and he was very thankful they strictly enforced the building codes. Haiti has no government to enforce anything.
 

mountainannie

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For anyone who might be led to send aid for the earthquake victims - the organization that appears to be on the ground getting the victims the most help is the https://zanmilasante.org/home#. which is the Haitian medical operation established by Dr. Paul Farmer. I put the link to the local group - their web page is in French. The Haitian operation is about 1/2 the budget of Partners in Health which is a global operation. https://www.pih.org/?ms=hp