Historic Earthquakes in Nepal – Reconnaissance Reports

 

Reconnaissance Reports

1934 Nepal–Bihar earthquake

Bihar, India – Nepal
1934 January 15 08:43 UTC
Magnitude 8.1
10,700 deaths. Extreme damage (X) in the Sitamarhi-Madhubani, India area, where most buildings tilted or sank up to 1 m (3 ft) into the thick alluvium. Sand covered the sunken floors up to 1 m deep. This liquefaction damage extended eastward through Supaul to Purnia, India. In the Muzaffarpur-Darbhanga area south of the zone of liquefaction most buildings were shaken apart by “typical” severe earthquake damage. Two other areas of extreme damage (X) from shaking occurred in the Munger (Monghyr) area along the Ganges River, India and in the Kathmandu Valley, Nepal (USGS).

Reconnaissance/ Damage Assessment Reports:
Reconnaissance Report
Reconnaissance Report- NISEE library

 

1988 Nepal earthquake

Nepal-India border region
1988 August 20 – 23:09:09 UTC
Magnitude 6.8
Seven hundred twenty-one people killed, 6,553 injured and 64,470 buildings damaged in eastern Nepal, including the Kathmandu Valley. Maximum intensity VIII. Liquefaction observed in a 5,500 sq. km area of southern Nepal. At least 277 people killed, thousands injured and extensive damage in northern Bihar, India, particularly in the Darbhanga-Madhubani-Saharsa area. Damage in the Gangtok area, Sikkim and in the Darjiling area, India. Felt in large parts of northern India from Delhi to the Burma border and in much of Bangladesh (USGS).

Reconnaissance/ Damage Assessment Reports:
Reconnaissance report
EERI Newsletter
GEM Database

 

2005 Kashmir earthquake

Pakistan
2005 October 09 – 03:50:40 UTC
Magnitude 7.6
At least 86,000 people killed, more than 69,000 injured and extensive damage in northern Pakistan. The heaviest damage occurred in the Muzaffarabad area, Kashmir where entire villages were destroyed and at Uri where 80 percent of the town was destroyed. At least 32,335 buildings collapsed in Anantnag, Baramula, Jammu and Srinagar, Kashmir. Buildings collapsed in Abbottabad, Gujranwala, Gujrat, Islamabad, Lahore and Rawalpindi, Pakistan (USGS).

Reconnaissance/ Damage Assessment Reports:
EERI Special Report
Damage Assessment – GFDRR
Preliminary Report – IITK

 

2011 Sikkim earthquake

Sikkim-India
2011 September 18 – 12:40:51 UTC
Magnitude 6.9
At least 97 people killed, several injured, 5,000 displaced and 3,917 buildings and many roads and bridges destroyed or damaged in Sikkim, eastern Bihar and northern West Bengal; 6 people killed, 25 injured and at least 4,300 buildings destroyed or damaged in the Sankhuwasabha-Panchthar-Ilam area, Nepal; 7 people killed and 136 injured in Tibet, China; 1 person killed, 16 injured and at least 6,000 buildings damaged in the Paro-Thimphu area, Bhutan; minor damage to several buildings in Dhaka, Bangladesh (USGS).

Reconnaissance/ Damage Assessment Reports:
Damage Assessment Report
EERI LFE Archive
Reconnaissance Report – IITK 
Damage Survey Report

 

 

Figure 1. History of Nepal Earthquakes (source).

Curated topics from the April 25, 2015, Nepal Earthquake to help inform reconnaissance activities, identify impacted regions, and help document the timeline of earthquake response/recovery.