2003 Boumerdès earthquake

The earthquake off Algeria in 2003, also Boumerdes earthquake, was an earthquake in the Mediterranean on 21 May 2003 off the coast of Algeria, died by 2266 people. There was a tsunami ( " tidal wave ", literally meaning " harbor wave" ), which reached the Balearic Islands and caused damage there.

History and cause

On 21 May 2003 it came at 18:44 clock UTC ( 19:44 CET) in the sea about 20 km north-east of Boumerdes, the capital of the province of Boumerdes, an earthquake with a magnitude of Mw 6.8. The depth of the hypocenter was determined with ten to twelve kilometers.

The earthquake epicenter lies in the border region of Caucasian and African plate. The African plate is moving here at a rate of 6 mm per year to the northwest against the European plate. Earthquakes are common, and are caused by movements of page shifts and thrusts. The fault plane solution indicated that the earthquake was caused by over -pushing movements.

Direct damage

The seismic shocks were over 1000 building collapse in the coastal regions of the country. In total, more than 40,000 houses were damaged, about 150,000 people were left homeless. The earthquake claimed 2266 lives, and more than 10,000 people were injured. The infrastructure of the Algiers- Boumerdes - Reghaïa - Thenia region was severely affected, and submarine cable off the coast was interrupted by submarine landslides. The damage amounted to about 100 million U.S. dollars, other estimates range from 600 million to 5 billion from.

Tsunami

Through the shock waves triggered a tsunami that moved at 300 km / h through the Mediterranean. 54 minutes later, at 20.45 clock, put on the coasts of the Balearic archipelago, which lies about 272 kilometers from the epicenter, the water up to 150 meters back. Shortly thereafter rolled by two consecutive, about two meters high waves and flooded the beaches and some beach roads. A tsunami wave was also observed on the Spanish coast of Alicante, Castellon and Murcia.

The quake before Algeria was not very strong, which could be transferred to the tsunami too much energy is not. He reached only a small amount. Nevertheless, in Mallorca were ( Palma ) and Ibiza ( here especially in the port town of Santa Eulalia ), some fishermen's huts and dozens of cars destroyed or washed away nearly 200 boats. People did not come to harm, had since the Oceanographic Institute of Palma de Mallorca found the sea level fluctuation prior to striking the shaft and spread a warning.

Consequences

While this was not the first tsunami in the Mediterranean ( as early as 1908 had the earthquake of Messina a much more devastating tsunami triggered ), but after the news of the incident began a public debate on protection measures and early warning systems for the Mediterranean, which is a highly earthquake-prone zone. Because in the Mediterranean leaves very little time for warning and subsequent evacuation. While the tsunami in the Pacific can need more than seven hours to walk across the ocean, they can take the opposite coast already within 30 minutes in the Mediterranean.