Learning From Earthquakes

LFE Response to M6.8 Morocco Earthquake

EERI’s Learning From Earthquakes (LFE) program continues to monitor the impacts of the destructive M 6.8 earthquake that struck near Oukaïmedene, Morocco at 11:11 pm local time on Friday, September 8, 2023. According to Moroccan authorities, at least 2,946 people were killed and more than 5,674 were injured. Significant structural damage, including many building collapses, occurred in rural communities in the Atlas mountains as well as in the historic city of Marrakesh. The EERI community extends its sympathy to the victims as the relief work continues.

Photo: Building damage in Marrakesh (Luis Bozzo)

View the LFE earthquake page here for resources and information on this earthquake. More about the LFE response and future reconnaissance findings will be shared there and in forthcoming issues of the Pulse.

News of the Institute

June 2023 Board Meeting Highlights

The EERI Board of Directors met virtually on June 29, 2023. The meeting was chaired by President Janiele Maffei.

At this meeting, the Board reviewed and approved previous meeting minutes and notes, confirmed 2023 board liaison assignments, appointed Thalia Anagnos as the new co-chair of the Oral History Committee, and approved the formation of a new student chapter at Seattle University. The Board also approved the selection of the 2023-24 NEHRP Graduate Fellow and a subject nominated by the Oral History Committee for an oral history volume. The Board approved the members of the 2023 Nominating Committee, reviewed the candidate criteria for the 2023 Board election, and heard an update on venue selection and planning for the 2024 Annual Meeting in Seattle, Washington.

The Board reviewed the executive director’s report and a membership report, and approved 2024 individual and subscribing member dues. The Board also reviewed and approved financial and investment reports for 2022 and 2023 Q1, heard updates on EERI’s transition to a new accounting system, and reviewed and approved a timeline for the 2024 budget process.

The Board discussed a series of mid-cycle updates on the 2021-2025 EERI Strategic Plan, focusing in particular on progress towards Strategic Goals 1 (Institute Infrastructure and Operations), 2 (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion), and 3 (LFE Program Alignment).

The Board also heard an update on two draft Public Policy and Advocacy Committee position statements (on comprehensive tsunami risk management in the United States and synergies in approaches to earthquake and climate change resilience) that are in the process of being finalized and submitted for Board approval at a future meeting.

2024AM

Call for Special Session Proposals and Poster Abstracts

EERI is excited to announce the Call for Special Session Proposals and Poster Abstracts for the 2024 EERI Annual Meeting (2024AM)—Uniting Earthquake Science and Engineering for a More Resilient Future!

The 2024AM will be held April 9-12, 2024 at the Sheraton Grand in downtown Seattle, Washington. The technical program will take place on April 10-11 and will feature multiple member-organized special sessions on a range of topics related to earthquake engineering, risk, reconnaissance, and resilience, as well as two evening poster sessions. We welcome proposals and abstracts on the following topic areas, and we are particularly interested in sessions that approach a topic with a multidisciplinary lens and/or merge perspectives from academia and practice:

• Big Data, Machine Learning, and Artificial Intelligence
• Building Codes and Building Performance
• Cascadia Subduction Zone (particularly topics of broad national/international interest)
• Climate, Multi-hazard Modeling, and Earthquake Resilience
• Geotechnical Engineering
• Hurriquakes, Beastquakes, and Swiftquakes
• Planning and Data
• Policy
• Post-Earthquake Emergency Response and Planning
• Risk Modeling and Insurance
• Seismology and Earth Science
• Social Science
• Socioeconomic Impacts and Vulnerable Populations
• Structural Engineering
• Tsunamis

Learn more about the annual meeting at the 2024AM website here. You can find more details on the Call for Session Proposals and Poster Abstracts here. Please note: no conference papers will be accepted or required. Submissions do require a short session description or poster abstract of 300 words or less. The deadline for all submissions is Tuesday, October 17, 2023 at 11:59 PM Pacific Time. All papers should be submitted via Proposal Space. Click here to start your submission!

Apply to be a 2024AM Technical Session Organizer!

Do you want to be a part of the 2024 EERI Annual Meeting planning? Apply here to be a Technical Session Organizer! Technical Session Organizers will be assigned to one or two 2024AM special sessions during the session acceptance process. They will be in charge of following the session's progress from start to finish, making sure all session proposers, moderators, and speakers are prepared and meet deadlines. They will also be responsible for all organizational and logistical elements for the session. This includes but is not limited to:

1. Scheduling at least 2 coordination calls with speakers, moderators, and the session proposers.

2. Relaying questions to staff from speakers.

3. Sharing speaker instructions (which staff will create).

4. Collecting speaker presentations in advance of the meeting to share with staff.

5. Provide on site assistance during the session as needed.

6. Review the conference website for accuracy for their session(s).


The time commitment is expected to be 4-6 hours per session. This work will begin once proposed sessions have been accepted (estimated to be in December 2023). EERI Staff and the 2024AM Organizing Committee will be selecting about 10-16 individuals to serve in this role. You will be notified in Fall 2023 if selected. The deadline to apply using this form is Sunday, October 1, 2023 at 11:59pm Pacific Time. 

Webinars

Quick Quake Briefing: Turkey M7.8 & M7.5 Earthquakes of 6 February 2023—Insured Loss Aspects

Thursday, September 28, 2023
9:00-10:00 AM Pacific Time
REGISTER HERE

The EERI Northern California Regional Chapter is hosting a FREE webinar on the earthquakes that struck Turkey. The topic deals with how earthquake losses are covered by insurance in Turkey and contrast to that in United States.

On 6 February 2023, a M7.8 earthquake struck southern and central Turkey and northern and western Syria. It was followed by a M7.5 earthquake later the same day. There was widespread damage and tens of thousands of fatalities. The total cost of earthquake damage in Turkey was estimated by TÜRKONFED at $84 billion US dollars ($71B on rebuilding, $10B loss in national income, and an additional $3B loss in workforce). The Turkish government released a preliminary report estimating the total damage cost at $103.6 billion, corresponding to 9 percent of its GDP in 2023. About half of residential property in the affected area is thought to be covered by Turkish Compulsory Earthquake Insurance (source: Wikipedia).

Speakers:

• Dr. Ufuk Yazgan is a Professor at Istanbul Technical University, and will pro-vide an overview of the damage to the building stock.
• Mr. Erdem Karabostan is the General Manager at the Turkish firm T-Rupt that advises on loss estimates for the Turkey Reinsurance Industry. He will explain how the insurance industry operates and responded to the earthquakes.
• Dr. Patxi Uriz is a Director at Moody’s Risk Management Solutions (RMS) Corporation (USA) focusing on catastrophic risk management. Dr. Uriz leads the earthquake and wildfire vulnerability teams at Moody’s RMS. He will contrast the Turkish and US construction and insurance practices.

The webinar will include time for participants to ask questions of the speakers.

YMC Webinar: Performance-based seismic assessment of slopes: simplified, FDM-small deformation, and MPM-large deformation analysis

Friday, September 29, 2023
10:00-11:00 AM Pacific Time
REGISTER HERE

This webinar will present a review of the existing methods to assess the seismic performance of slopes. First, the simplified models developed based on Newmark stick-slip blocks that are applicable to different tectonic settings (shallow crustal, interface, and subduction) will be briefly discussed. Then, the use of FDM-based small deformation analysis will be illustrated through a case study. Finally, the recent numerical developments implemented in a large deformation framework, such as the Material Point Method, for the simulation of the overall failure process (including post-failure runout will be presented.

Speakers:

• Dr. Alba Yerro is an Assistant Professor at Virginia Tech. Her primary research is on the study of slope failures and soil-water-structure interaction problems involving large deformations.
• Dr. Jorge Macedo is the Frederick Olmsted Early Career Professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Dr. Macedo’s main research areas are geotechnical earthquake engineering, data-driven risk engineering applied to multi-hazards, and mining geotechnics.

Ishihara Colloquium: Advancing Earthquake Engineering in the Wake of the Turkey-Syria Earthquake

Starting October 5, 2023
11:00 AM-2:00 PM Pacific Time
REGISTER HERE

Join EERI's San Diego Chapter for the 2023 Kenji Ishihara Colloquium: Advancing Earthquake Engineering in the Wake of the Turkey-Syria Earthquake. This year's colloquium will take place virtually, as a webinar series on the lessons learned from the 2023 Kahramanmaraş, Turkey Earthquake Sequence. Researchers, expert engineers and social scientists will come together in this Kenji Ishihara colloquium to discuss structural engineering and the far-reaching social implications of the Turkey earthquake sequence. Experts will share their insights on the lessons learned from the Turkey earthquake and how these are shaping the future of earthquake engineering, disaster preparedness, and response to enhance engineering practices and expedite seismic functional recovery.

The webinars will take place on Thursday October 5, Thursday October 12, and Friday October 27, each starting at 11:00 AM Pacific Time. The webinar lengths will vary by session but will run no later than 2:00 PM. Registering once at the link above will allow you to attend all the sessions.

Thursday 10/5: Lessons Learned from Processing Ground Motions & Code Comparison

• Grace Park
• Tristan Buckreis
• Osman Ozbulut
• Esra Zengin

Thursday 10/12: Functional Recovery of Hospitals and Schools and Recovery of Lifeline

• Ali Sumer
• Reid Zimmerman
• Ricardo Cappa
• Ezra Jampole
• Rupa Garai

Friday 10/27: Topic to be determined

• 
Louise Comfort
• Additional speakers to be confirmed

Announcements

SMIP23 Seminar

The California Strong Motion Instrumentation Program (SMIP) of the California Geological Survey will hold its annual seminar virtually on Thursday, October 19, 2023.  The SMIP23 Seminar will include various presentations on the analysis and utilization of strong motion data.  The seminar program and online registration are available at the SMIP23 Seminar website here.  Registration fees are waived for this year’s seminar.

Kinemetrics Webinar: Earthquake Early Warning Meets Actionable Information

Kinemetrics is hosting a free webinar about Earthquake Early Warning on October 11, 2023 at 9:00 AM Pacific Time.

What happens when you merge Earthquake Early Warning with all the information and tools you need to respond once the shaking hits? You gain precious moments of warning to prepare for building motion, and the situational awareness you need to perform effective, responsible emergency response. This ultimately results in confidence, speed, and the best possible outcome.

OasisPlus is a Complete Earthquake Business Continuity Platform designed to provide the tools and information you need before, during, and after an earthquake to minimize impact and ensure an effective emergency response. In this webinar, Brandon Parrott will introduce brand new functionality designed to bring earthquake early warning capabilities to the OasisPlus Platform. This new functionality extends your situational awareness prior to the building shake, and puts you in the best position to make better-informed decisions. Register here to attend the webinar!

Opportunities

CRESCENT Hiring Community Collaboration Program Manager

The Cascadia Region Earthquake Science Center (CRESCENT) is a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded research center that coordinates research, educational, and community engagement activities surrounding earthquake science and hazards in the Pacific Northwest, operated out of the University of Oregon.

CRESCENT is seeking a Community Collaboration Program Manager (CCPM) to manage the community collaboration program at CRESCENT, which includes overall program strategy and outcomes. The community collaboration program is responsible for coordinating the dissemination of research findings from the earthquake hazards research teams to community partners, working with community partners to promote the active use of those findings, and providing the research teams with feedback and inquiry requests. For more information about the position, requirements, and how to apply, view the job posting here. Review of applications will begin September 28, 2023.

Subscribing Member Spotlight

COSMOS

Established in 1997, the Consortium of Organizations for Strong Motion Observation Systems (COSMOS) promotes collaboration among programs and institutions to improve strong-motion measurements, to solve mutual problems with instrumentation and data, and to assist in strong-motion data dissemination.

Enidine

Established in 1966, Enidine provides products and services to the industrial, aerospace, defense, rail and transportation markets throughout the world. The company is a premier supplier of engineered mechanical shock absorbers, vibration isolation products, noise attenuation products as well as deceleration devices and products for hydraulic/pneumatic actuation and motion control applications. ITT’s global resources, six-sigma and lean manufacturing provide Enidine the resources to stay at the forefront of new technologies, research & development, and high-quality production.

News of the Profession

Links to Recent News and Views

• Mapped: Morocco earthquake that killed over 2,000 and levelled buildings in Marrakech (The Independent, quoting EERI Board Member Jonathan Stewart)
• Morocco earthquake is a warning for California: Weak brick buildings can become deathtraps (The Los Angeles Times, quoting EERI members Lucy Jones and Kit Miyamoto)
• Many buildings in Morocco are vulnerable to quakes, architects say (The New York Times)
• ‘My neighbours dug for me with bare hands’: Morocco earthquake survivors grapple with loss and chaos all around (The Guardian)
• Fears for Marrakesh’s ancient structures after Morocco’s earthquake (Al Jazeera)
• Buried under the bricks: How mud-brick housing made the Morocco earthquake so deadly (Reuters)