The well-being of the 2017 beach season was disrupted by the unfavorable seismic situation on the Turkish and Greek coasts. After the 6.3 magnitude earthquake in Turkey in Turkey, Lesbos Island (Greece) was severely damaged, where one of the villages was destroyed, one person died and there were 15 wounded. On July 21, the resorts of the Aegean Sea were shaken by a series of new shocks, resulting in more severe destruction and numerous casualties.
Disaster
Bodrum is a popular Turkish resort for foreigners and residents during the holidays and summer months. It barely began Friday July 21, when at half past one in the night the earth began to shake, and the city suffered a seismic strike of 6.7 points. The epicenter of the earthquake was in the Aegean Sea at a ten-kilometer depth of about 10.3 km southeast of Bodrum and 16.2 km east of the Greek island of Kos, which was chosen by Europeans. According to eyewitnesses, the first strongest wave of the earthquake in Bodrum (Turkey) lasted ten seconds.
After the main seismic strike, numerous aftershocks followed - repeated shocks of less intensity, of which there were more than twenty. At least 13 aftershocks (12 in Turkey and one in Greece) shook resort areas for three hours. And five of them exceeded 4.0 points, and one aftershock at 1:52 am reached 4.6 points. The earthquake caused tsunamis with waves half a meter high and a 25-centimeter amplitude.
Earthquake assessment
CNN meteorologist Karen Majings said the same day that an earthquake of magnitude 6.0 to 6.9 was classified as strong, and a relatively shallow epicenter depth (10 km) ranks the July 21 seismic strike as a major one. She also warned that aftershocks would last for weeks, maybe months.
Within the radius of the greatest seismic activity there were about 900,000 people who felt the power of the main shock and a number of aftershocks as much as possible. According to estimates of automated earthquake reporting systems, 4.3 million people felt this earthquake in Turkey with varying degrees of intensity.
Effects
The settlements closest to the epicenter of the earthquake suffered varying degrees of loss. The greatest destruction, severe wounds and two deaths occurred in the Greek resort of Kos, despite the fact that it was farther from the epicenter than the coast of Turkey, where the earthquake caused much less damage. The tsunami wave flooded the Turkish and Greek beach hotels, in some areas the power transmission and gas distribution networks were damaged, due to the overload there were interruptions in mobile communications, cracks and landslides appeared on the roads in some places. Since aftershocks lasted a long time, most tourists and the population of coastal cities spent the night on the streets, and some hospitals were evacuated for the same reason.
Damage in Turkey
The earthquake occurred at night when most of the tourists and the indigenous population were indoors. Despite this, deaths and serious injuries did not follow. The port resorts of Mugla and Bodrum are believed to have suffered the most damage, although the coastal city of Marmaris was the closest settlement to the epicenter. The destroyed buildings of Turkish cities were not reported, but only minor damage, a broken water supply network, gas leakage and power line breaks.
Mugly’s manager Esengul Chivelek said at a press conference that the initial reports did not reveal serious losses, and a small number of people suffered minor injuries. Mugli Mayor Osman Gurun said power outages had affected some parts of the province, and telephony operators had problems due to congestion. Bodrum Mayor Mehmet Kokadon said that the earthquake in Turkey caused small cracks in some old buildings, damage to one road and the breakdown of moored boats at berths. According to Boğaziçi Üniversitesi, a Bosphorus University research center in Turkey, 80 people were injured without serious injuries, and no deaths were reported.
Losses in Greece
The island of Kos has suffered the greatest losses and casualties. According to the president of the Kos Island Hotel Association, Constanta Swinou, there were 200,000 tourists there on July 21. The mayor of Kos, Georges Kiritsis, told the local radio that the main city received the damage, but there were no serious problems in the rest of the island. He confirmed that the old building collapsed, and people were crushed by its debris, several of them were injured, two people were killed. All damaged structures were mostly old, built before the introduction of construction registers for seismically dangerous regions.
Giorgos Halkidios, a regional government official on the island of Kos, confirmed information about the devastation in the city and added that more than 100 people were injured. A representative of the city’s fire department reported three wounded who were rescued from under the collapse. The Greek coast guard informed of port damage and the termination of the ferry service for some time. According to the Greek press, among the damaged historic and residential buildings was the collapsed Ottoman minaret of the Defterdar Mosque.
Fatal bar
South Aegean Governor George Hadzhimarkos told the Greek Sky channel about the deaths of two people. Death overtook a 22-year-old Swede and a 39-year-old tourist from Turkey when they were in the White Corner Club bar, which was located in a building built in 1920. This establishment and the urban area, known for its bars, were very popular among tourists. After the first, most powerful shock, at 1:30 in the morning the roof of the White Corner Club collapsed, crushing visitors. Some managed to run out, most were injured. According to local police, another Swedish tourist who was there lost both legs.
Seismic history
The Aegean region is one of the most seismically active in the world because it is located at the intersection of several fault lines, including northern Anatolia. Because tremors with an intensity of 5-7 points in the Turkish and Greek territories are frequent. Last year’s summer earthquake in Turkey brought to mind the more terrible and not so long-standing tragedies.
- 1903 in Turkey was remembered by two earthquakes. The first, with a power of seven points, shocked Malazgirt in April, which led to the destruction of 12,000 buildings, killing 3,500 people. In May, tremors reached 5.8 points, several villages were affected, and more than a thousand people died.
- 17,000 people died in 1999, when an earthquake was recorded in the vicinity of Izmit that exceeded seven points in intensity. On August 17, it ravaged the northwestern densely populated areas of the country, and the Istanbul district was particularly affected. The same earthquake produced tremors with an intensity of 5.9 points in Greece, where 143 people died.
- In October 2011, 600 people died in the Turkish province of Van as a result of a severe earthquake with a magnitude of 7.2 and a number of strong aftershocks.
- In 1912, 2,800 people were injured, and 80,000 were left homeless after the August earthquake of 7.4, after which 25,000 buildings were destroyed.
The tragedy of 1999 led to a review of permissible building codes for earthquake-prone Turkish regions. Now houses are being built in Turkey taking into account seismic stability. Perhaps that is why the coast of this country suffered less than the Greek Kos.
August 2017
On August 5, a 5.3-point tremor, with a series of subsequent aftershocks, completed the summer earthquake season of 2017. The epicenter was again in the Aegean Sea near Turkish Bodrum - 15 kilometers southeast of the city at a depth of 6.96 km. This time there were no casualties.