Chile earthquake

• 27th of February 2010
• The magnitude measured 8.8
• Struck just off the coast of Central Chile
• Followed by some small aftershocks
• Tsunami warnings issued

GDP = 38 / 193 (ranking)

HDI = 41 / 187 (ranking)

• Happened at a destructive plate boundary
  • The Nazca plate moving beneath the South American plate
• The earthquake happened at sea so a tsunami was likely to happen
  • Wave speed was up to 80km/h

• 800000 affected
• 500 killed
• 12000 injued
• Buildings destroyed
  • 220000 homes
  • 4500 schools
  • 53 ports
  • 56 hospitals 
• Port of Talcahuana and Santiago airport badly damaged
• Much of Chile lost power, water supplies and communications
• Cost = $30 billion (estimate)

• 1500km of road damaged (mainly because of landslides)
  • Remote areas were cut of for several days
• Several coastal towns destroyed from tsunami
• several pacific countries struck by tsunami (warnings prevented loss of life)
• Fire started at a chemical plant (near Santiago - area had to be evacuated) 

• Emergency services acted quickly
  • International help supplied field hospitals, satelite phones and floating bridges
• Temporary repairs made to some main roads to allow the transportation of aid from Santiago
• Power and water restored to 90% of homes in 10 days
• National appeal raised $60 million (for building 30000 small shelters

• Chile's government started a housing reconstruction plan to help nearly 200000 households
• Chile coul rebuild their economy without the need fo help from foreign aid (copper export -lots of income)
• The president announced that it could take 4 years for Chile to fully recover (from damage to buildings and ports)