Human and Physical factors of the Haiti earthquake Flashcards
How does the Population Density of Haiti contribute as a Human Factor?
High density residential buildings mean that more people are living in a smaller area. This means that when the earthquake took place, more people are negatively affected and trapped in and under buildings.
How does Haiti’s level of development contribute as a Human Factor?
Haiti ranks as 156 on the Human Development Index (ranked out of 182 countries). This shows that Haiti is a developing country, meaning that factors surrounding earthquakes (safety measures and warnings, treatment and sanitation, and etc.) are negatively affected.
How does Haiti’s Building standards contribute as a Human Factor?
In Haiti the concrete used for building is mostly poor quality, leaving it porous and uncompressed. As well as this, there is no building code in Haiti, no licensing requirements for architects and contractors. Finally, no seismic design safety precautions are included in the engineering curriculum in Haiti.
How does Haiti’s Finance and poverty contribute as a Human Factor.
The government of Haiti has $450 worth of debt per every one of it’s 10 million inhabitants, leaving it 4.5bn dollars in debt. As well as this, 50% of it’s population are in poverty, earning less than $1 a day as a result of the extremely high unemployment rate (70% of the population are unemployed or underemployed)
How does the location of the earthquake’s epicentre contribute as a Physical factor?
The earthquake’s epicentre was 25 km west of Port-au-Prince, which is the capital of Haiti. With most of the main businesses and services in the capital, the capital was very densely packed with buildings.
How does the magnitude of the earthquake contribute as a Physical factor?
The earthquake itself was a magnitude 7.0 on the Richter Scale, but it was rated as an XI on the Mercalli scale, meaning it felt extremely violent. This fact shows that even if there were proper safety measures in place, the effect would still have been damaging to an extent.
