The School Earthquake Safety Program in Kathmandu Valley: Building safer communities through schools

Author(s)
Asian Disaster Preparedness Center
Publication language
English
Pages
8pp
Date published
01 Jan 2003
Publisher
Asian Disaster Preparedness Center
Type
Research, reports and studies
Keywords
Accountability and Participation, Participation, Capacity development, Disaster preparedness, resilience and risk reduction, Disaster preparedness, Disasters, Urban
Countries
Nepal
Organisations
Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC)

AsianImagine, the earth shakes for no more than a minute, but “many schools
which did not prepare for an earthquake are now suffering. Many school
buildings are heavily damaged with children trapped inside of them. The
children who are safe are crying from fear . . . Many parents are worried
and angry because their children have not returned home, nor are they
in school, nor can they be seen on the road.”
The Kathmandu Valley’s Earthquake Scenario (a product developed by
the Kathmandu Valley Earthquake Risk Management Project or KVERMP)
sketched this chilling picture against the background of an earthquake
with a magnitude close to 8.3 on the Richter scale – similar in degree to
the catastrophic earthquake that struck Nepal in 1934.