Turkey quake worst since 1939 Erzincan temblor: A look back at what happened

At least 1,900 people have been killed and thousands of others left injured after three quakes rocked Turkey on Monday. A 7.8 magnitude earthquake shook Turkey and Syria followed by another strong quake four kilometres south-southeast of the town of Ekinozu and another quake in the evening. President Tayyip Erdogan on Monday described the first quake as a ‘historic disaster’. He said 2,818 buildings collapsed after the first tremor, which he called Turkey’s “largest disaster” since 1939. As Stephen Hicks, a research fellow in seismology at Imperial College London, tweeted:

But what happened in 1939? Let’s take a closer look: On 26 December, 1939, a major quake also measuring at 7.8 magnitude struck Turkey’s eastern province of Erzincan. At least 30,000 were left dead and thousands of buildings were damaged in the Erzincan quake.

The quake occurred on the North Anatolian Fault Zone (NAFZ), according to ScienceDirect.com.

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The NAFZ is of the most active strike-slip faults in the world, as per Journal of Geodynamics. [caption id=“attachment_12113242” align=“alignnone” width=“806”] The quake created a 360-km-long surface rupture. Image courtesy: Journal of Geodynamics[/caption] According to the journal, it created a 360 kilometre surface rupture on five different segments (Barka, 1996) and also caused the most loss of life in Turkey during the 20th Century. More than 300 km of “surface faulting” was observed between Erzincan and Niksar “with as much as 3.7 m of horizontal displacement and 2.0 m of vertical offset”, as per Indian Express. A tsunami at Fatsa on Turkey’s Black Sea coast was recorded by tide stations from Russia’s Tuapse to Ukraine’s Sevastopol, according to the newspaper. **Also read: Turkey earthquake claims over 500 lives: Why temblors in the West Asian country are so deadly** The quake caused “extreme damage in the Erzincan Plain and the Kelkit River Valley”, as per Indian Express. According to ScienceDirect.com traces of the surface rupture in 1939 can still be prominently observed. As per The New York Times,  a number of earthquakes have occurred along the faultlines including: October 2020 A magnitude 7 earthquake near Samos, a Greek island in the Aegean Sea near Turkey’s coast, killed at least 24 people in Turkey and caused more casualties in Greece. January 2020 A magnitude 6.7 quake shook eastern Turkey, killing at least 22 people, injuring hundreds and causing tremors in Syria, Georgia and Armenia. October 2011 A magnitude 7.2 earthquake in eastern Turkey killed at least 138 people and injured about 350. The quake was centered in Van Province, not far from the border with Iran, and it was felt strongly in nearby villages and some parts of northern Iraq. March 2010 A magnitude 6.0 earthquake also struck eastern Turkey, killing 51 people. One village was largely destroyed and four others were heavily damaged. A second quake with a 5.6 magnitude subsequently hit the same area, among scores of aftershocks. August 1999 A magnitude 7.4 earthquake that struck the western Turkish city of Izmit killed more than 17,000 people. With inputs from agencies Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News , India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.