IntroductionNepal was vigorously shaken to the core.
With a magnitude of 7.8 earthquake hitting the vulnerable country in South Asia on the 25th of April 2015, it had the earth moving and the people wishing for anything but another aftershock. Its epicentre was approximately 34km east-southeast of Lamjung and 77km northwest of Kathmandu and its focus was 15km underground (Rafferty, 2018). The earthquake began with two sets of P waves, as it can be seen, followed by a S wave and a very destructive L wave.
The surface wave, being much stronger than the other waves, obliterated everything in its path with its large amount of energy and vibrations. CausesTectonic plates are known to be the foundational forces that shape the Earth’s surface and the Indian and Eurasian plates are known to be the enemies of Nepal and its population. The convergence of two plates along the major fault line where the Indian plate slowly dived underneath the Eurasian plate had caused the earthquake. The plates were both continental crusts, therefore, they were pushed up to form high mountain ranges (CK-12 Foundation, 2018). Moreover, Dr Soma Nath Sapkota, deputy director-general of the geoscience division at the Kathmandu Department of Mines and Geology, claimed that this record-breaking earthquake of Nepal was a result of a prehistoric tectonic collision (Kyriacou, 2015). Between the 55 and 40-million-year time period, the Indian plate had collided with the Eurasian plate, which had created such tremendous stress that was relieved by a skyward thrust that uplifted the Himalayan Peaks. Today, as the Indian plate continues to move forward at a rate of 45mm per year, the force within the earth’s crust is released through earthquakes along the fault lines in this region.
