another bangkok earthquake!

some of you may remember a few months ago i blogged about the rather strong earthquake that was felt here in bangkok almost exactly a year ago.

last friday i was sitting at my office computer writing some end-of-the day emails when suddenly there was a loud creak from the building and i felt movement. the aircon had just switched on so at first i thought that might be it, but then i felt a sway similar to an earthquake. my blinds and door were moving back and forth slightly but i thought perhaps it too was the aircon. after 10 seconds or so i walked over to ask one of my office staff if she had felt anything- she hadn't, so i returned to my desk thinking perhaps i was just dizzy from being at the keyboard too long.

i remembered a few moments ago what happened and checked out the usgs website. was amazed to find that there in fact was an earthquake during that time. unlike last year's bigger earthquake i couldn't find any references to the quake online aside from the usgs report. what i did find was that a talk entitled, 'earthquake disaster in bangkok, can it be true?' was scheduled for last friday at the asian institute of technology. bit of a coincidence that an earthquake would be felt in bangkok the same day, eh!

doing a bit more searching i found an interesting paper written in part by the speaker of the talk, k. pennung warnitchai, which describes a seismic hazard assessment conducted on bangkok. the conclusion is that although bangkok in not danger of an earthquake happening nearby, a very strong earthquake a few hundred kilometers away could cause a great deal of destruction here in bangkok, similar to the mexico city earthquake of 1985.

would be curious to know k. pennung's thoughts, but i'd venture a guess that construction standards in regards to seismic capability aren't stellar here in bangkok. if cracks appear in major new buildings from a moderate earthquake hundreds of miles away, what would happen if there was a massive quake closer?

on a related topic, i found a report describing 'durability issues' with bangkok's buildings which contains some nice photos of shoddy construction found in bangkok and nearby. a friend who lives in my building heard a loud noise one morning- he looked outside and saw that a large slab of concrete had fallen off a building on soi 10 and crashed through the roof of a house below. the building on soi 10 is covered in cracks- could be one of those durability issues mentioned in the paper.