'QUAKE MENACE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 49, 27 February 1937, Page 11

'QUAKE MENACE.

AN UNHAPPY LEGACY.

RESEARCH WORK IN INDIA.

BETTER BUILDINGS NEEDED. CALCUTTA, January 5.

Means to forestall or ameliorate the worst effects of earthquakes in India were explained by Mr. \Y. D. West, of I the Geological Survey of India, to the ! geology section of t lie Indian Science Congress at Hyderabad, Deccan, this month. The occurrence of earthquakes in India, said Mr. West, was a legacy of the great earth movements that convulsed the , northern flanks of India during Tertiary and Quaternary times, and a belt of mountains, including the Alps and Himalayas, was thrown up on the site of an extensive sea. India was at present passing through a period of marked earthquake activity. Earthquakes were almost entirely confined to the north of a line joining Bombay to Delhi and Delhi to Calcutta. It was unfortunate that it included the most populated tracts of India. ('ontinuing. Mr. West' said: "There would appear to be two lines of approach; (1) to investigate the possibilities of predicting the incidence of earthquakes, both with regard to place and time; (2) to recognise the inevitability of earthquakes within the danger zone, and to adopt measures of protection against them in accordance with principles that are now well known. "Seismological research that is being done more or less independently by the Geological Survey of India, the Meteorological Department and the Survey of 1 Tndia. should bo co-ordinated and exj panded by developing a special Seismo--1 logical branch of one of the existing

services. To minimise tlie destructive effects of earthquakes the Defence Department of tlie Government of India is considering the be*t method of making the buildings in cantonments within the earthquake zone more resistant.

"There remains for consideration the far greater problem of improving the standard of other buildings, both Gov-ernment-owned and private, throughout the earthquake l>elt. If all new construction and town planning in the more important cities is controlled by building code., drawn up in accordance with local needs, and enforced by provincial Governments and local boards, a start will have been made, which will itself have a cumulative effect."