Haiti Earthquake-CASE STUDY

• Haiti


  LIC (Low Income Country)
• Earthquake in Haiti


  January 2010
• Reducing the impact


  • Rebuild buildings with more technical designs to withstand future earthquakes
  • New building code as priority
  • Move people out of high density slum housing into more stable housing away from hillsides
• Earthquake cause


  • North American Plate sliding past the Caribbean Plate at a conservative boundary
  • Plates move in the same direction, but one moves faster than the other
  • Pressure built up due to friction between the 2 plates was eventually released suddenly
• The earthquake had a magnitude of 7 on the Richter Scale
• The earthquake had an epicentre 16 miles West of Port-au-Prince and a shallow focus of 5 miles
• Earthquake struck at 16:53 (4:53pm) local time


  Tuesday 12 January 2010
• Short-term Relief


  1. Many countries sent search and rescue teams to help search for survivors

  2. Food, water, medical supplies were sent from the US and Dominican Republic

  3. US engineers and divers cleared the port so aid could be unloaded

  4. UN and US troops provided security when distributing the aid

  5. The UK raised £100 million, this provided emergency shelters, medication, bottled water and purification tablets and sanitation
• Long-term Relief


  1. The Government moved 235,000 people from Port-au-Prince to less damaged cities

  2. Three quarters of the damaged buildings were inspected and repaired

  3. 200,000 people were paid or received food for public work such as clearing away the rubble

  4. Money was given by individuals and governments around the world (included €300 million Euros from the EU, $100 million from the USA, £20 million from the UK: The World Bank also cancelled Haiti's debt repayments for 5 years