Vulnerable city
Photo: Amdadul Huq / Driknews
The city is not safe at all. The city is not safe in case of a moderate quake, let alone a severe one. Only a magnitude-7 quake may damage Dhaka city entirely. Recently, Haiti was damaged fully. Even the buildings of the president and the prime minister could not escape the quake. More than one lakh people died. Thousands of people were injured and millions of people have became homeless. Whenever a major quake occurs, we start thinking about our unplanned populous, tottering Dhaka city. Earthquake is a natural calamity, forecasting which is not possible and its prevention is also impossible. But taking some precautionary measures the losses may be minimised. The first thing is to build a planned city and an earthquake resistant building code should be followed during construction of buildings and infrastructures. In this case Japan may be our example. We know it is the most quake prone country in the world. Taking technological assistance from Japan, we can build earthquake resistant buildings. So to protect Dhaka city and other big cities from a huge quake, some vigorous measures should be adopted as soon as possible.
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