The Mexico City Earthquake, 30 Years on: Have the Lessons Been Forgotten? David Adler - The Guardian
go to original September 18, 2015

A residential block collapses during the Mexico City earthquake in September 1985. (Keystone USA/Shutterstock)

The devastation of the 1985 Mexico City earthquake was swift. In just over a minute – in the early hours of 19 September, while the city was still asleep – 100,000 houses crumbled, 5,000 people died and roughly five million residents were left without electricity or potable water.

...Situated between three large tectonic plates, Mexico is a seismological nightmare. Mexico City is its most vulnerable city, built as it is on a sinking lake bed. With a magnitude of 8.1, the 1985 earthquake pushed Mexico far past its breaking point.

Three decades later, however, El Centro bears almost no trace of this devastation. With millions of dollars poured into development projects by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, the rubble of 1985 has been replaced by new sidewalks, public furniture, freshly painted tenements and outdoor Wi-Fi. City officials maintain that building codes are enforced, and the mayor’s office has developed a six-point plan in case of future emergencies. In the 30 years since the earthquake, the city government has managed to transform Mexico City’s wealthy center into a major tourist destination.

Yet, in the peripheral zones, beyond the tourist’s reach, informal settlements continue to proliferate. There, codes and regulations are irrelevant. Residents build with whatever materials they can find and afford, and they continue to struggle to gain access to basic services such as water and electricity. For all the improvements of the last 30 years, roughly 60% of the city is made up of these unregulated, informal and vulnerable zones.

The growth of these settlements over the last three decades attests to the persistence of poverty and inequality in Mexico City – and as a result, its vulnerability to its next big earthquake.

Read the rest at The Guardian

This video documents the health problems and relief efforts in the aftermath of the earthquakes of September 19 and 20, 1985. The first earthquake (8.1 in the Richter scale) left more than 10,000 people dead or missing and thousands more injured. (pahopin)

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