The powerful earthquake that shook Cuba and caused destruction: “It reminds us that deadlines are respected”

It was almost 11 a.m. last Sunday when different provinces of Cuba began to sense strong movement. It was a earthquake 6.8 which had a precursor earthquake of 5.9, leaving residents in fear and many homes and buildings with structural damage.

The epicenter was in the sea, 35 kilometers from Bartolomé Masó and 175 km from Santiago de Cuba, as reported by United States Geological Survey (USGS) .

Faced with the emergency, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel indicated on his X account that he was communicating with the provinces affected by the earthquakes, where There were “landslides, damage to houses and power lines”.

“We are asking our population in these areas to go out and stay in open places. We begin to assess the damage to begin recovery. The first and foremost thing is to save lives. wrote the president.

But, Is it normal for things to shake so much in Cuba? Should we expect an earthquake?

The geophysicist Luis Donoso of the University of Development (UDD) explains to The Third that Cuba is a seismic country and these latest movements “remind us that the deadlines are respected”.

And a trend in Cuban archives shows that At regular intervals, a new powerful earthquake could occur, a situation similar to that occurring in Chile.

The professor of applied geophysics, Luis Donoso, tells The Third that Cuba is an earthquake country and that it has two main types: one which is associated with the interior of the North American plate and another with the contact of the same plate with that of the Caribbean.

“This last earthquake occurred at the contact between the North American plate and the Gonâve microplate in the northeast fault zone,” he explains.

Now, according to the expert, A large earthquake was expected to occur on these dates, because “each area with large earthquakes notably has what is called the ‘recurrence period'”.

“In this case, For this area, the average is 80 to 90 years. This implies that around or after this period, there is a high probability that another large earthquake will occur.

That is to say, last Sunday, in the affected area in Cuba, There could be strong earthquakes, like the recent one, every 80 or 90 years.

“It was totally expected. The chronology which marks the seismic activity allows us to appreciate how ripe or unripe an area is for the associated earthquake to recur. “This earthquake is generated by the elastic deformation accumulated by the movement between tectonic plates.”

Along the same lines, even though the date or location of an earthquake cannot be predicted preciselyExperts can get an idea of ​​when a specific region might be affected by tracking records over the years.

This is why The recent earthquake in Cuba corresponds to an “expected” earthquake, Well, it’s been 80 or 90 years since the last fort, so it was expected to repeat itself in those years.

In Chile something similar is happening : “Draw a parallel with the central area of ​​Chile, Our case is similar if you look at the sequence 1647, 1730, 1822, 1906 and 1985.

Following the above, The next big earthquake could occur between approximately 2065 and 2075.

“Cuba has a significant seismic history” he said The Third the geophysicist Donoso. “Their efforts to identify risk areas associated with earthquakes, whether of intraplate or contact origin, are formidable. »

Howeverthere were some failures that allowed the latest earthquakes to affect the infrastructure of the areas where the movement was perceived with more intensity.

Karen Rodríguez, a 28-year-old Cuban hairdresser who lives in a village in Bartolomé Masó, one of the worst-hit areas, said: AFP that homes in their community suffered considerable damage. Several homes were left with cracked walls, falls and collapsed roofs. This, in a context where the country had already recently been damaged by the passage of Hurricane Rafael.

On the other hand, in the province of Granma, the journalist Eugenio Pérez reported partial collapses of structures in the municipalities of Pilón and Niquero.

On this subject, Donoso explains that “Seismic construction regulations and their actual application are a difficult area to evaluate due to the lack of transparency of information. It is expected that in modern construction areas it will meet the standard, but in older buildings it will be inapplicable due to lack of maintenance or investment.

Additionally, because the Caribbean is a seismic zone, it should be prepared to withstand earth movements. Especially because “As of 2012, 100 large earthquakes and 28 tsunamis causing damage have been identified over the past 500 years.”