In 1906, the residents of San Francisco, California, had an abrupt change of lifestyle. They
learned that almost anything can happen without warning. An earthquake killed about 3,000
people and caused over $400 million in property damages.

In 1920, the Gansu earthquake in China took about 200,000 lives. Then in 1948, the region
around Ashgabat in the Soviet Union suffered a powerful quake that claimed over two-thirds of that city's population (110,000 people died).

About Earthquakes

The most powerful earthquake ever recorded happened in 1960 in Chile. Registering 9.5 on the
Moment magnitude scale, it created a tsunami that swept the entire Pacific Ocean. In 1972, 90 of the city of Managua, Nicaragua, was destroyed by a midnight earthquake that killed over 10,000 people.

Then in 1985, the Great Mexican Earthquake struck, killing as many as 30,000 people, most of whom were never found. In 1989, San Francisco and surrounding areas experienced the "World Series Quake."

In 2003, the Bam Citadel, the largest adobe structure in the world and built before 500 B.C. was almost completely destroyed, together with 70 of the city of Bam and 70,000 residents.

Most of them happen along what is known as the circum-Pacific seismic belt or the "Pacific Ring of Fire" bounding the Pacific tectonic plate.

With high-population cities like Mexico City, Tehran, and Tokyo growing in areas of high risk, it is possible that a future earthquake could take as many as 3 million lives.

It's hard to understand why people insist on living in earthquake-prone areas like San Francisco and the mountains of central and South America. But in fact, earthquakes are a common phenomenon, small ones happening somewhere in the world every day.