Jiji earthquake
| Jiji earthquake | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| Coordinates | 23 ° 46 ′ 19 ″ N , 120 ° 49 ′ 12 ″ E | ||
| date | September 21, 1999 | ||
| Time | 01:47 (local time) | ||
| Magnitude | 7.7 M W | ||
| depth | 8 kilometers | ||
| epicenter | at Jiji , Nantou County | ||
| country | Taiwan | ||
| dead | 2415 | ||
| Injured | 11305 | ||
The Jiji earthquake ( Chinese 集集 大 地震 , Pinyin Jíjí dàdìzhèn ), also known as the Chichi earthquake or 921 earthquake ( Chinese 九二一 大 地震 , Pinyin Jiǔ-èr-yī dàdìzhèn , in Taiwan), occurred in central Taiwan on September 21, 1999 at 1:47 am local time. The epicenter was 9.2 km southwest of Sun Moon Lake , near the township of Jiji in central Taiwanese Nantou County . The hypocenter was about 8 kilometers deep. The strength of the earthquake was measured by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) with a moment magnitude of 7.6 to 7.7 M w . The quake ran along the Chelongpu - fault parallel to the foothills of the Taiwanese Central Mountains and drew especially the counties Nantou and Taichung (now Taichung City ) affected.
Expiration and damage
The earthquake hit just before 2 a.m. that night and hit a large part of the population while they were sleeping. There were numerous aftershocks after the main quake. The gauges recorded more than 10,000 earth movements, including four very strong ones, three with magnitudes of 6.8 and one with magnitude 6.5, all coming from the same epicenter. In terms of seismic moment , the quake was ten times stronger than the 1995 Kobe earthquake in Japan and 50% stronger than the 1999 Gölcük earthquake in Turkey.
Building and personal damage
The worst damage occurred in the districts of Taichung, Nantou, and Yunlin , but the quake was also clearly felt in the northern regions. More than 8,500 buildings with around 60,000 residential units were destroyed and another 6,200 with around 50,000 apartments were badly damaged. The death toll exceeded 2,400 and more than 10,700 people were seriously injured. More than 100,000 people were left homeless as a result of the quake. Immediately after the earthquake and destruction, the relief and rescue measures began. More than 5000 people were rescued from collapsed or badly damaged buildings by volunteers and organized rescue personnel. The numerous roads and bridges, mostly destroyed by landslides, presented a particular challenge and made it difficult for aid workers to get to the victims, especially in remote areas. Two large landslides occurred near the epicenter, one of which buried nearby settlements and the other led to the damming of a small river. The latter led to the evacuation of the people living downstream, as a dam was feared. According to government sources, 4,685 people were successfully evacuated from rural areas after makeshift roads were built.
| circle | dead | Injured | Missing | Rescued | Evacuation via makeshift roads |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Taipei | 71 | 316 | 22nd | 149 | 0 |
| Hsinchu | 2 | 4th | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Taichung | 113 | 1112 | 0 | 155 | 0 |
| Chiayi | 0 | 11 | 0 | 14th | 0 |
| Taipei County | 39 | 145 | 7th | 192 | 0 |
| Taoyuan County | 3 | 84 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Hsinchu County | 0 | 4th | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Miaoli county | 6th | 196 | 0 | 34 | 0 |
| Nantou county | 889 | 2421 | 10 | 2144 | 912 |
| Taichung County | 1170 | 5602 | 8th | 1402 | 1992 |
| Changhua County | 29 | 387 | 0 | 286 | 0 |
| Yunlin County | 80 | 423 | 0 | 628 | 454 |
| Chiayi County | 2 | 5 | 4th | 0 | 1327 |
| Tainan County | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Yilan County | 0 | 7th | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| total | 2405 | 10718 | 51 | 5004 | 4685 |
Damage to industry and infrastructure
About 9,000 industrial companies in 53 industrial parks across the island reported damage from the earthquake. Overall, the building and machine damage was rather moderate. Few factories were destroyed. In the Hsinchu industrial park, a facility for precision manufacturing of semiconductor components was damaged, causing considerable damage. However, many companies in this industrial park had smaller generating sets that could be put into operation. Overall, however, production had to be shut down significantly, or some of the finished products were damaged by the power failure and thus become worthless. Two anchorages in Taichung harbor were partially damaged by soil liquefaction . 30 of the 590 bridge structures inspected after the quake showed damage. Five had completely collapsed, nine more required emergency repairs, and 16 more were classified as damaged but still safe. Extensive damage to the Shihgang Dam , which provided around 40 to 50% of the water used in the Taichung region, as well as damage to numerous water pipes, resulted in the water supplies being impaired to nearly 5 million end users nationwide.
The provincial highway 8 (中部 橫貫 公路), the most important west-east cross connection across the Central Mountains, was badly damaged and closed in 2009 due to subsequent storm damage and the high costs of restoration.
Failure of the power supply
The failure of the energy supply proved to be momentous. The earthquake caused a major nationwide power outage . For the residents of the capital Taipei, which is relatively far from the epicenter, the earthquake was announced a few seconds beforehand by the power failure. The power outage had three main causes: First, an overhead line mast had failed, over which two of the four central high-voltage lines ran, which connected the northern with the central parts of the power grid. Second, the Zhongliao (Chungliao) distribution station in Nantou County, a central hub between the networks of the south and the north, was practically completely destroyed by a landslide. Thirdly, the two nuclear power plants in the north of the island, Chin Shan and Kuosheng - although they were not significantly affected by the earthquake themselves - malfunctioned due to the imbalance in the power grid and had to be shut down for a week. 355 high-voltage pylons were damaged across the country. The destruction of the Shihgang Dam and the substation on the Tienlun Dam, as well as further damage to hydropower plants, contributed to the failure of the hydropower energy required as a reserve. The countermeasures taken immediately by the energy supplier Taiwan Power Company (“Taipower”) gradually restored the energy supply by temporarily bridging failed connections. At first, critical facilities were given priority (airports, railways, water and electricity supplies, military facilities), followed by large industrial companies. The power supply for smaller businesses and private households was initially rationed. The restoration of an almost normal state of the energy supply dragged on for weeks after the earthquake.
International aid
Numerous organizations from abroad offered their help after the disaster. Since Taiwan is diplomatically fully recognized by hardly any other country in the world, this aid could mostly not come through direct government contacts, but many heads of state and government leaders expressed their condolences with the Taiwanese people in view of the disaster. The following day, it was announced that the United States would be sending an 85-strong relief team. Japan pledged a 100-strong relief team, Singapore sent a team of 39 helpers and South Korea one of 60 rescue specialists, Russia one of 76, and Turkey one of 15. Offers of help and some staff came from Germany, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Spain, Israel and Thailand. There were also numerous monetary donations from all over the world.
Damage analysis
The severe damage caused by the earthquake was somewhat unexpected and a shock. The last earthquake of comparable severity in Taiwan was the 1935 Hsinchu Taichung earthquake with a magnitude of 7.1, which claimed at least 3,500 lives. It had previously been assumed that the northern and western island regions would be less affected by earthquakes than the eastern regions, where the Eurasian and Philippine plates meet .
Total economic damage has been estimated at around US $ 10 to 12 billion, of which US $ 8 to 9 billion is direct damage and US $ 2 to 3 billion is indirect damage from production downtime. This included an estimated $ 600 million in insurance losses.
After the earthquake, analyzes came to the conclusion that a particular type of construction was the main reason for the high level of building damage. The vast majority of buildings in Taiwan are less than 100 years old and strict building regulations have been in place for decades to ensure earthquake resistance. The damaged and destroyed buildings were accordingly generally in reinforced concrete been executed construction method (Bauskelett of reinforced concrete, filled with masonry). However, too little emphasis was placed on sufficiently stable and stable supporting pillars and structures on the ground floor, as shops and passages were often housed here that required the largest possible open space facing the street. Therefore, between the supporting reinforced concrete pillars, there was often no masonry that would stabilize against shear forces. As a result, the pillars on the ground floor tilted and caused the entire building to collapse. In the case of some collapsed buildings, it also turned out that parts of the structures were not made of solid construction, but, for example, empty oil canisters had been built in, obviously to save building material, which might have caused structural instability.
In response to the severe power disruption, representatives from Taiwan Power Company (“Taipower”), Taiwan's state-owned power company, said that Taiwan's power grid needed to be upgraded to avoid similar power outages in the future. Statutory regulations were cited as the main argument as to why this had not happened so far. Taipower representatives expressed their frustration that multiple previous attempts to acquire suitable land to erect high-voltage pylons had failed. Under these conditions it is hardly possible to guarantee the energy supply.
Economic impact
At the time of the earthquake, Taiwan was home to more than 50% of global wafer production and more than 10% of global silicon semiconductor production. In addition, Taiwan produced about 80% of all motherboards in personal computers, most of the computer mice and keyboards produced worldwide, and a significant proportion of video monitors . Immediately after the earthquake, concerns were expressed that there could be bottlenecks here. About a week after the earthquake, damage to the Taiwanese semiconductor industry was estimated at US $ 400 million. However, only 5% of this was due to actual damage to property and the remainder to losses due to process interruptions. In the period that followed, there was a significant price increase for memory modules on the world market . In June 1999, 64MB of data storage was US $ 40 and one week after the earthquake it was US $ 160. One month after the quake, the price had dropped back to US $ 80. The Taiwanese manufacturers were able to quickly compensate for their losses due to the prolonged price increase.
Government financial benefits
The Taiwanese government set up a reconstruction aid fund in December 1999 for a period of five years. The Central Bank of China , the central bank of Taiwan, issued low-interest loans for the reconstruction of earthquake-damaged houses totaling US $ 3 billion. The government paid each homeowner US $ 6,500 per fully destroyed home and US $ 3,250 per partially destroyed home. The earthquake occurred in the run-up to the 2000 presidential election , which took place on March 18, 2000. Various top candidates tried to present themselves in the media as experienced and serious crisis managers.
Web links
- Taiwan government website on the 921 earthquake
- Website of the Earthquake Museum in Taichung
- China Times topic page on the Jiji earthquake
- 15th anniversary of deadly Taiwan earthquake , YouTube video (CNN)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Chi-Chi Reconnaissance Team: Event report: Chi-Chi Taiwan earthquake. (pdf) Risk Management Solution, 2000, accessed on September 23, 2017 (English).
- ↑ Lauren Chen: World leaders express their condolences. Taipei Times, September 22, 1999, accessed September 24, 2017 .
- ↑ Chiu Yu-Tzu: Taipower's grid structure must change, experts say. Taipei Times, November 30, 1999, accessed September 23, 2017 .
- ^ A b Brian Sherin, Stacy Bartoletti: TAIWAN'S 921 QUAKE AND WHAT IT MEANS TO THE SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY. (pdf) Retrieved September 24, 2017 (English).
- ^ Wayne Arnold: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS; Taiwan Quake to Be Costly to World Technology Makers. The New York Times, September 23, 1999, accessed September 23, 2017 .
- ^ Wayne Arnold: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS; Chip Makers on Taiwan Are Soon Back in Business. The New York Times, September 23, 1999, accessed September 23, 2017 .