Date: Monday, April 6, 2009
Location: L’Aquila, Itlay
Magnitude: 6.3
Damage: 10-15,000 buildings damaged
Casualties: 207 dead/1,500 injured
Related Tsunami/Volcano: None
Around 3:30 in the morning on Monday, April 6, the worst earthquake to strike Italy in almost 30 years hit the city of L'Aquila in central Italy. The quake occurred as a result of normal faulting on a NW-SE oriented structure in the central Apennines, a mountain belt that runs from the Gulf of Taranto in the south to the southern edge of the Po basin in northern Italy. The
U.S. Geological Survey said the main quake was a magnitude 6.3 but
Italy's National Institute of Geophysics, using the
Richter scale, put it at 5.8. The epicenter of the quake was roughly 70 miles east of Rome.
Initially 150 people were reported dead, but the death toll continues to rise as rescuers pull bodies from among the 10,000 to 15,000 buildings damaged or destroyed from the quake. At least 50,000 people from the surrounding area were left homeless from the earthquake. It was Italy's deadliest earthquake since No 23, 1980, when a 6.9-magnitude quake hit southern regions, leveling villages and causing some 3,000 deaths.
The effects of the quake have not only damaged lives, but they have damaged the culture and history surrounding L'Aquila. Many Romanesque, Gothic, Baroque and
Renaissance landmarks were damaged, including the partial collapse of one of the cities most picturesque sites, the pink-and-white stone basilica of
Santa Maria di Collemaggio, which had stood since 1300. The bell tower of the 16th-century San Bernardino church fell, and stones tumbled down from the city's cathedral, which was rebuilt after a 1703 earthquake. Damage to monuments was reported as far away as Rome, where cracks appeared at the thermal baths built in the
3rd century by the emperor Caracalla.
Source: Yahoo, NY Daily News, USGS
Date: Tuesday April 7, 2009
