The 2005 Kashmir Earthquake – devastation of infrastructures

The 2005 Kashmir earthquake (Mw 7·6) affected predominantly non-engineered dwellings that were poorly designed and constructed, and located in rugged, mountainous terrain. In response to this, many technical guidelines for seismically safe reconstruction of the affected residential buildings were proposed. However, these guidelines seem to have been prepared without adequately investigating the root causes of this tragic devastation. Thus, for the reconstruction exercise to be safe and sustainable, it became pertinent to consider all the contributing factors and incorporate them in the guidelines. This paper therefore presents a severity analysis of the factors that contributed to mass-scale devastation of social infrastructures during the earthquake. The findings reveal that ground/location-related factors (such as inappropriate selection of construction site, strong ground motion, co- and post-earthquake mass movements) have the highest level of contribution to the mass-scale devastation of non-engineered structures. The paper provides an original contribution to knowledge through a methodical investigation of the root causes of the mass-scale devastation of non-engineered structures during the 2005 Kashmir earthquake. The findings of this study could be extended to future earthquakes in the same region, owing to similarities in topographical conditions as well as the design and construction practices.