Chengdu 'safe as a steel pot'

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-08-09 16:56

The Yangtze mass has been stable for between 800 and 900 million years. Because of the stability and consolidation of its crust about 30 km thick, Chengdu is "as safe as sitting in a steel pot", he said.

Due to the completely different geological structure, Chengdu would at most shake , but would not suffer major damage if a powerful earthquake again struck along formations like the Longmenshan faults, he said.

It takes considerable time for the crust to gather energy before each major earthquake. After the energy is released, it will take centuries to gather energy before another major earthquake.

"So Chengdu will be safe for the next 200 years and no magnitude 8 or higher earthquake will take place. Chengdu's geological structure has not been made unstable by the Wenchuan earthquake. As a matter of fact, it is more stable than before because of the energy released," Liu said.

A fault zone is the prerequisite for a disastrous earthquake. But the Yangtze Plate on which the Chengdu Plain is situated is stable, and Chengdu has no large underlying faults, said Cao Junxing, a scholar with the Chengdu University of Technology.

In its recorded history of over 2,000 years, Chengdu and the surrounding seismic zone have never had an quake higher than magnitude 8. History indicates that in the past 700 years, the fault on the edge of the Chengdu Plain had three earthquakes measuring magnitude 5 to 5.5, while earthquakes measuring magnitude 4.5 and lower occurred inside the Chengdu Plain.

Despite the close proximity of Chengdu and the Longmenshan Mountains, the city is in a relatively soft sediment-filled depression that absorbed seismic waves on May 12, said Ni Shijun, a scholar from the Chengdu University of Technology.

(China Daily 08/06/2008 page15)

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