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Earthquake: Why did some houses collapse and some not? The renowned engineer explains

Shkruar nga Anabel

29 Nëntor 2019

Earthquake: Why did some houses collapse and some not? The renowned engineer
Neighboring villas and ruins of the Lala family villa

When we visited what used to be the Lala family villa, the neighbor's villa impressed us. No scratches, no fallen plaster, no flaws, nothing. Did you say that the earthquake only fell to the disaster stricken, to the extinct family. The question naturally arises: Why did some houses collapse and some not? This is best explained by the civil engineer, Mrs. Luljeta Bozo, who has been pronounced on camera dozens of times to calm the public with facts.

In a statement to A2 News, ing. Bozo explains why some of the buildings in Durres and Thumana were destroyed.

"A well-designed and properly implemented construction with anti-seismic rules suffers nothing. You have to know that the engineers who do this work, who are structural engineers, when calculating, consider what facility they are building. Residential facility, a school, a hospital, which are objects of particular importance where there is a high concentration of people. Consider how long the life span is, that each object has a life expectancy, and how many times within its lifetime it can suffer earthquakes that the engineer can take action. Not every earthquake can take action. Up to nine fronts with the old Merkel scale that measures the scale with the damage the structure suffers.

Albania is located in an area called the "Fiery Belt" which is the whole area of the Mediterranean. It's a very weak area. It is the dividing border of the two EurAsian tiles with Africa. In this area, 25% of earthquakes occur in the world. People need to understand that we are in a space that will shake from time to time. In these examples, there are two things that have not been respected. There are many, but two are the main ones:

They didn't know where to build. They are built on very weak terrain, which amplifies the oscillation. In the hills surrounding Thumana the oscillations were very low, while in the Thumana very large. The land displacements are very large. As the earth shifts, so does the object above the ground.

?It should not and should not be built in the Durres Marsh. It has been categorically forbidden. The marsh of Durres has become a city. There is no guarantee for the safety of those objects that are in the Durres marsh.

The same goes for the construction on the beach of Durres. Seismic microcosm studies by a large group of highly skilled scientists in Albania, seismologists, engineers, geologists - is still that study and no one is using it - has resulted from the Kavaja Rock all the way to Kavaja Sand it is likely that due to the earthquakes caused by the earthquake it may cause structure breakdowns and return to normal sludge. Imagine what happens if you do not recognize this as a phenomenon and your foundations are in the place where the earth turns into sludge. The slightest evil is to sink vertically. The worst is to remove or overthrow it like Hotel Ljubljana. ?

Thumana's constructions were very old. They were made around the 1970s. They are made on a voluntary basis. Which means that there was a brigadier and all the people who were interested in getting an apartment went, made their contribution, recorded the hours and got an apartment. But they are not a construction specialist. It's just like being told to heal a sick person. I can't cure it. I have enough medical culture to maintain my health, but not to heal others. So the masonry rules were not respected there, because they were made with masonry. Different materials are used, which is not allowed. The soles have been unprepared, the soles moving at the time of seismic oscillations and only the anti-seismic band is connected. Many rules have been violated there, including the elementary requirements for a sustainable building.

To the building that was cut off two floors as if someone had cut it, it was brick, I don't know for sure, but looking, I say they have broken the structure down. They have removed the walls to make local. You can't do this when you're not a specialist. You can't remove the load-bearing walls during seismic oscillations than getting them local.