12/26/2019 0 Comments Earthquake Preparedness in Los Angeles Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 wordsEarthquake Preparedness in Los Angeles - Essay Example Land sliding and mudflows is obviously a hazard in case earthquake jolts Los Angeles. Bush fires are a big hazard associated with earthquakes. Rupturing of gas lines causes bush fires in Los Angeles after an earthquake (Hyndman & Hyndman, 2010). There is a term “transform boundaries†which occurs when two plates crush past each other and a very limited convergent and divergent activity takes place. Now San Andreas fault is a major fault in California. City of Los Angeles is situated on pacific plate which is slowly moving towards north with respect to North American plate. According to predictable motion Los Angeles and landmass west of San Andreas fault will slide towards San Francisco and then towards Aleutian trench. It is not only the San Andreas fault marking the conventional margin between the pacific and other north American plates but transform faults are major cause of earthquake in Los Angeles. Recent earthquake that damaged the Los Angeles occurred in 1994 and it remained focused on the north ridge area (Hyndman & Hyndman, 2010). Movement of earth’s crust is the cause of earthquakes in California and Los Angeles. North American plate is moving towards east and pacific plate is expanding towards west and the point comes where these two plates pass each other. The North American plate is moving at the speed of approximately 2 inch per year. ... Like other mountains in California and Los Angeles these mountains are also pushed up by the earthquakes in past. Although few of the faults have been buried beneath the basin of Los Angeles and inland valleys but even then many of them can still be seen on the earth surface in the region (Geschwind, 2001). Out of the recent earthquakes in Los Angeles the earthquake of 1994 focused on the Northridge area. The registered intensity of the earthquake was 7.6 on the Richter scale. The earthquake lasted for 30 seconds but aftershocks kept coming for several days. Water and gas pipe explosion, land sliding and collapse of structure resulted in sudden death of about 60 people. Power supply was cut to the houses and because of infrastructural damage people were trapped in their homes. More than 500,000 houses were without electricity supply due to natural disaster. Due to more than 11 earthquakes since 1970, the city of Los Angeles is now known as hazard city (Hyndman & Hyndman, 2010). Due to structure of the earth and movement of plates in California, one major earthquake is expected in a century. Despite the chances of earthquake in future the attitude of people is quite different and they do not thing such an incident to take place in their lifetime. People are not ready to pay for different improvements to withstand earthquakes in future. Large companies and organizations in the city have managed to construct such huge buildings that have the capability to absorb certain amount of vibration and shock if earthquake takes place. Buildings being constructed now in the city are also vibration resistant to tackle the future earthquakes. Now earthquakes will cause relatively less damage to industrial areas as the buildings are
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What Holes Has The Financial Crisis Revealed In The G8 Will The G20 Fill Such Holes - Essay Example
World’s wealthiest country; America was the major sufferer of this crisis. In fact many people believe that America was responsible for stimulating recent global recession. The unhealthy lending habits of American banks and the crazy life styles of American public have given momentum to the recent financial crisis. G8 and G20 are two of the major coalitions in the world at present. G20 was proposed by former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin in 1999 to deal with international financial matters. Sustainable development is the major theme of G20. It is also interested in solving global energy crisis, economic problems, demographic problems etc. Australia, Canada, Saudi Arabia, United States, India, Russia, South Africa, Turkey, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, France, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom, China, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea and European Union are the members of G20. On the other hand the Group of seven (G-7) comprises Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, United Kingdom and United states. “The G7 is often referred to as G8 because Russia fully participated in all but financial and certain economic discussions of G7 since the 1998 Birmingham summitâ€. Before the formation of G7, G6 was formed in 1974 by world's major industrialized democracies such as United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, West Germany, Japan and France. In 1975 Canada joined G6 and it became G7. Russia joined G7 in 1997 to make it G8. Since, its formation G8 contributed heavily to global economy. Fratianni, et al (2005) pointed out that “The world without G8 would be more brutish and riskier than it is now†(p.4). The recent financial crisis has unveiled many of the loopholes in G8 functioning whereas G20 stood well to the challenges raised by the recession. It should be noted that G8 consists of mainly European and American countries whereas G20 consists of countries from Asia also. It is often said that global wealth is currently shifting from America and Europe to Asia at present. This is evident from the fact that most of the prominent Asian countries escaped from recession problems whereas American and European countries are still struggling for survival. In other words, G8 failed miserably in tackling recession problems whereas G20 managed these problems well, mainly because of the contributions of Asian countries. This paper analyses the loopholes in G8 in tackling recession problems and the ability of G20 in filling that loopholes. What holes has the financial crisis revealed in the G8? Even though G8 countries are believed to be the wealthiest countries in the world, recent financial crisis has unveiled the loopholes in the governance of these countries. According to Fratianni et al. (2007), “Today, the G8 leaders are dealing directly with central question of how to build better global governance in both public and private sphere†(p.23). As a result of globalization, privatization is taking place at rapid pace in most of the countries. Moreover, governments in G8 countries are privatizing many of the publicly owned companies to stay away from the responsibilities of servicing the people. It is a fact that private capital is essential for the economic growth of a country. However, uncontrolled private capital in critical sectors may bring more harm than good. India like emerging economies is allowing private participation cautiously even though they are following mixed economic policies. On the other hand, China does not allow private capital in critical sectors even though they are doing everything possible to encourage private capital on all other sectors. G8 countries on the other hand allowing private companies to invest at will in all major industrial |