1999, the year in which an earthquake of the same magnitude left 17,000 dead in Turkey

Turkey has registered this morning one of the strongest earthquakes in its history since 1939. The earthquake, which already adds more than 1,200 dead and 5,000 injured, is reminiscent of the one that occurred in 1999, the year in which an earthquake of the same magnitude occurred: 7.8.

The earthquake that occurred in that year became known as the izmit earthquake, although it also has other names such as Kocaeli or Nicomedia, in Greek. On that occasion, it was recorded at 3:00 in the morning of August 17 at a depth of 15 kilometers.

An earthquake that became one of the most destructive in the region, leaving between 17,100 and 18,300 deaths, consequence of a tremor that lasted more than half a minute. This was part of a North Anatolian fault seismic sequence that had started in 1939, causing large earthquakes that moved from east to west for about 60 years.

The truth is that the country is on a great fault, which means that it has had more than 90 earthquakes of more than five degrees of magnitude since 1903. In fact, before 1999 there were other earthquakes that had big consequences. Now, the United States Geological Survey estimates that the death toll could reach 10,000.

The origin of the strongest earthquake of the century

The earthquake that has occurred in Turkey has already become one of the strongest in the century, but how did it originate? Isabel Zubiaurre explains in Al Rojo Vivo what the origin of this earthquake is.

“If we delimit the tectonic plates we can see how it is at a triple point of union between three that are the Arabian, the African and the Eurasian. In addition, we can see the smallest, that of Anatolia, where the plates have slippeds that have produced the earthquake,” he said.

According to the United States Geological Survey, the magnitude of this earthquake may produce a fault break 190 kilometers long and 25 kilometers wide.