Why did Bam Break?

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Why did Bam Break?
16
Tue, 12-30-2003 - 8:01pm
Why did so many have to die in Bam?

David Aaronovitch

Tuesday December 30, 2003

The Guardian

The Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei yesterday managed to get to Bam, three days after the earthquake which may have killed 30,000 of his fellow Iranians. The president, Mohammad Khatami, followed soon afterwards. Khamenei had words of dubious comfort for survivors when he told them that "we will rebuild Bam stronger than before". Given the collapse of 80% of the buildings, from the old fortress to the new hospitals, the Iranian government could hardly make the new Bam as weak as the old one.

Some will see this as simply a natural disaster of the kind to which Iran, according to Khatami, is "prone". Four days earlier, however, there had been another earthquake of about the same intensity, this time in California. In which about 0.000001% of the buildings suffered serious structural damage and two people were killed when an old clocktower collapsed. So why the polar disparity between Bam and Paso Robles?

This is not a silly question. True, the Californians are much richer than the Iranians. But if you believed everything you read in the works of M Moore and others, you would anticipate a culture of corporate greed in which safety and regulation came way behind the desire to turn the quick buck. Instead you discover a society in which the protection of citizens from falling masonry seems to be regarded as enormously important.

Whereas in Iran - for all its spiritual solidarity - the authorities don't appear to give a toss. The report in this paper from Teheran yesterday was revealing. It was one thing for the old, mud-walled citadel to fall down, but why the new hospitals? An accountant waiting to give blood at a clinic in the capital told our correspondent that it was a "disgrace that a rich country like ours with all the revenue from oil and other natural resources is not prepared to deal with an earthquake".

The reformist Iran News asked on its website, "How many times have we reminded the ruling establishment that the first structures to fall during a major earthquake would be those dealing with emergency management and relief, such as hospitals, police and fire stations? The officials in charge are either deaf or simply don't care."

Iran had the money to do much of what was needed. After the Kobe earthquake of January 1995 a report concluded that most deaths had been caused by the collapse of housing built in the traditional Japanese manner. This style was based on a post-and-beam system, with tiles or thick mud laid on top. The roofs came down easily, and when they did, they crushed everything beneath. And exactly the same thing seems to have happened in Bam, as much to new as to old buildings. The use of corrugated iron roofs would have been much safer.

So why, despite the loss of 40,000 lives in the Gilan earthquake of 1990, had nothing been done? The same question was being asked back in the queue outside the clinic. Fariba Hemati told the Guardian what she thought of official efforts, "Our government is only preoccupied with slogans: 'Death to America', 'Death to Israel', 'Death to this and that'. We have had three major earthquakes in the past three decades. Thousands of people have died but nothing has been done. Why?"

As she was queueing Jahanbakhsh Khanjani, spokesman for Iran's interior ministry, was denying that a team from Israel was coming to help. "The Islamic Republic of Iran," he told the press, "accepts all kinds of humanitarian aid from all countries and international organisations, with the exception of the Zionist regime." The Israelis, of course, have some reputation for rescue work, but it was ideology rather than humanity that was at stake here.

The answer to Hemati is that, after a quarter of a century, Iran is still being ruled by a useless, incompetent semi-theocracy, which is fatalistic, complacent, unresponsive and often brutal. And such a system does not deliver to its citizens one fraction of what the Great Satan, for all its manifest faults, manages to guarantee to ordinary Americans.

Following the fall of the Berlin wall there was, as the philosopher John Gray put it, a "false dawn" of the New Age of Liberal Democracy, in which all problems everywhere could be expected to be solved by a free market and free elections. But this triumphalism has been replaced, in some quarters at least, by the equally vacuous tropes of the anti-globalisation movement and its demonisation of liberal capitalism.

What, I wonder, has Arundhati Roy to say now about the superiority of traditional building methods over globalised ones? Some Iranians might think that it's a shame there wasn't a McDonald's in Bam. It would have been the safest place in town.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1113895,00.html

Renee

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2003
In reply to: wrhen
Thu, 01-01-2004 - 6:03pm

I see what you're asking.


Elaine

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
In reply to: wrhen
Tue, 01-06-2004 - 6:30pm
The Iranian National Seismological Center had provided the regime with report after report and data upon data stating that the repopulation of the area could prove to be disastrous. But the mullahs had responded by saying that the 12th Imam, who is "invisible," would shield the residents of the city from harm!

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/atasheen200401060800.asp

That's it; ignore a problem, and when it turns into a crisis, blame God.

The NRO article has a few other interesting tidbits:

*Khatami and Khamenei's visits to Bam...lasted no more than a scant hour each. Though they were surrounded by "walls" of bodyguards, they could not be shielded from harangues and insults hurled at them. "It is your fault this happened to us," one woman cried. "You knew that this could happen and you liars never warned us."

*After the arrival of Khomeini and the Islamic republic, criminal elements appropriated large allotments of land in the region and created shoddy dwellings and markets. The local mullahs also received hefty kickbacks from the issuance of permits for such construction.

*Though the European aid workers are treated with respect, they also receive a great deal of aloofness. The arrival of a U.S. colonel and his aides in Hercules C130 military transport planes, however, proved to be a raging success. Iranians had gathered in the Kerman airport to greet them with arms full of flowers, shouting, "AMRIKAAYEE...KHOSH AMADEE" (American, you're welcome). Iranians hugged them and hung on to them as if their "saviors" had come. Departing Americans were met with pleas from the crowd, begging them to stay.

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
In reply to: wrhen
Tue, 01-06-2004 - 6:32pm

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
In reply to: wrhen
Wed, 01-07-2004 - 10:39am

Fresh quake fears in Iran.


http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=434682&section=news



Thousands of Iranians spent the night outdoors in the rain after 31 tremors jolted the oil-rich province of Khuzestan sparking fears of an earthquake like that which razed the city of Bam, state television says.


It said people had been afraid to go indoors since Tuesday morning when the first of the tremors hit the towns of Izeh and Masjed Soleiman in Khuzestan.

"Some houses have been slightly damaged, the schools have been closed," television said.

The tremors continued into Wednesday.

Iran is criss-crossed with fault lines and tremors are common, but the death of more than 30,000 people in a quake that struck the city of Bam on December 26 has set people worrying about another major disaster.

The official IRNA news agency said the 31 tremors ranged from 2.7 to 4.8 on the Richter scale. A quake of 6.8 on the Richter scale flattened the ancient citadel city of Bam.

Sattar Akbarzadeh, governor general of Izeh, said he had requested 20,000 tents to be sent to the area.

"Fire brigades and emergency vehicles have been moved to open areas," he told state television. "The Basij (volunteer militia) forces have been placed on alert."

cl-Libraone

 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-15-2003
In reply to: wrhen
Wed, 01-07-2004 - 11:07am
>>You are correct countries outside of the USA do not have the same strict building requirements as we do here,>>

Excuse me, but I think what you should have said is: SOME countries outside of the USA...etc.

We really need to jettison this erroneous belief that the USA is the be all and end all of all that is good and great.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
In reply to: wrhen
Thu, 01-08-2004 - 8:48am
This is amazing he survived. Hope he pulls through.

 


Photobucket&nbs

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