At any moment – day or night
Under Peru the Nazca Tectonic Plate pushes itself under the great South American Continental Tectonic Plate to a depth of 650km. Due to these constant tectonic movements one has to expect a small or a large earthquake in Peru at every moment. Last week, on 26th May, two people died in an earthquake in Northern Peru, in August 2007 500 people died, while the death toll of the earthquake in May 1970 reached 70,000. Last year the district of Curahuasi was the epicentre of an earthquake with a magnitude of 4 on the Richter Scale.
Due to this ever-present, great risk earthquake-drills are performed yearly in Peru which Diospi Suyana takes part in. On Friday morning at 10a.m. the sirens sounded throughout the country. Everyone had to get out of official buildings. The security measures worked brilliantly at the hospital Diospi Suyana. Both staff and patients left the buildings immediately and congregated at the designated meeting points. Several “injured” school pupils were treated immediately in the A+E.
According to Udo Klemenz the hospital’s buildings should withstand an earthquake with a magnitude of 8. Should there ever be even a tiniest building damage our building engineer has to build the whole hospital a second time. We will have to insist on that. /KDJ
