Australian Geography Assignment 2011

Newcastle Earthquake
In the morning of the 28th of December 1989, at 10:27 Newcastle was hit by
an earthquake measuring 5.6 on the Richter scale. This is still the most
devastating Earthquake to be recorded in Australia, with the loss of 13 lives
and an estimated $4 billion worth of damage to property. There was so
much destruction because the city of Newcastle was unprepared for a natural
disaster and the buildings were not structurally stable enough to stand in an
earthquake.

Earthquake is the name given to sudden tectonic movement of vast

proportions. An earthquake occurs when 2 or more continental plates, that
have been unable to move together or away from each other due to the solid
rock being ‘unwilling’ to move due to friction and being grinded together,
suddenly move from the immense forces that the
tectonic plates have been building up. There are 3
main types of earthquake. There are Strike-slip,
subduction (normal) and thrust earthquakes.
They are shown in the diagram to the right. The
difference is the directions the plates are trying to
move in relation to each other. In a strike-slip
earthquake, the 2 plates are moving along each
other but get snagged until excessive stress
destroys the snag. In a subduction earthquake, the
plates are pushing into each other and then one
plate gets pulled under the other, opposed to over,
as what happens in a thrust earthquake.
There are other rare types of earthquakes such as
volcanic earthquakes and Intra-plate earthquakes.

There was much response to Australia’s largest most destructive earthquake

on record. As the earthquake caused widespread destruction, there was a
massive clean up operation, in which many groups were involved. The
Australian military with branches of all three services being involved in the
cleanup projects, helping with the removal of rubble, from the 50 000
damaged buildings, as well as other charities and aid organizations which
helped feed and give the citizens water, infrastructure that had been affected
by the earthquake. As well as this 1000 people had been made homeless by
this disaster. These people had to be sheltered while their homes could be
rebuilt. Thanks to organizations like the Red Cross, and the government’s
emergency and military organizations the city of Newcastle was able to
quickly recover from the blow dealt by the earthquake.

The Newcastle earthquake had a serious financial impact on the Australian

government due to the funding of disaster relief and emergency housing of
approximately 1000 people. In total there was $3 Billion worth of damage
to property, including 40000 house and several thousand business and public
service buildings. On top of this insurance companies, in insurance claims,
gave out a further $1 Billion. This was a large sum of money and this does
not take into account the money spent on aid.
There were social effects to the earthquake as well. A total of 13 people
died as a result of the earthquake. This was a grim time for the families of
these victims, as well as having to deal with the damage to their homes and
city, a very bad experience for anyone, these unfortunates had to deal with
the pain of losing a mother or father, wife or husband, in these times were
people needed all the help and support they could get. Due to the fact that it
hit the city area, wildlife and their environments were not affected as much
by this disaster.

Though a major earthquake for Australia, the Newcastle earthquake is

nothing compared to other earthquakes of the Asia-pacific region. In 1976
there was a magnitude 7.5 earthquake in Tangshan, Hebei, China. In terms
of death toll, this is one of the worst earthquakes on record. 242419 people
were killed in the city, but due to the political struggles in China at the time
there are estimates that there could have be as many as three times are many
deaths. This is because the earthquake struck at 4am with no warning
foreshocks as normally happens with large earthquakes. Many people who
survived the earthquake were trapped under collapsed buildings. Due to the
assumed safety from earthquakes in the region, none of the buildings were
built to standards that could resist an earthquake; as such estimates are that
85% of all buildings in a 9km radius were destroyed or uninhabitable. There
is one thing that is common to these two earthquakes; there were casualties
due to the lack of preparations of buildings, in both Newcastle and
Tangshan, nobody had earthquake proof housing and this lead to easily
avoided deaths when buildings collapsed on people. This had a terrible
impact on both these earthquakes disaster zones as there was massive
damage, many thousands of people made homeless, billions of dollars worth
of damage, and families split apart by deaths and having to start a new life
after this destruction.

Bibliography
• Geoscience Australia 2011 ‘What causes Earthquakes’ viewed 1/5/11
http://www.ga.gov.au/hazards/earthquakes/earthquake-basics/causes.html
• Visit Newcastle 2011 ‘The Newcastle earthquake’ viewed 1/5/11
http://www.visitnewcastle.com.au/images/newcastle/Newcastle%20Earthquake.pdf
• Jennifer Rosenberg 2007 ‘Tangshang, the deadliest Earthquake’ viewed 1/5/11
http://history1900s.about.com/od/horribledisasters/a/tangshan.htm