Serguei Balassanian – författare

The main objective of this volume is to evaluate existing knowledge and evidence of active faulting and historical/prehistoric earthquakes in the wider Caucasus area, and to assess the impact on the evaluation of seismic hazard. The seismological interest in the Caucasus lies in the availability of historical records documenting a long history of devastating earthquakes, coupled with advanced knowledge of the seismotectonics and active faulting beneath the former USSR and supplemented by recent instrumental programmes, including extensive satellite geodesy surveys. It is also interesting to compare various approaches to seismic hazards developed in different cultures (USSR, Caucasus, Turkey, Iran). In addition, the area presents a textbook case for the implementation of improved building construction codes and for the protection of critical facilities, including the nuclear power plants in Armenia and the Crimea.

This volume contains selected presentations made at the Second International Conference on Earthquake Hazard and Seismic Risk Reduction held in Yerevan, Armenia, on 14-21 September 1998. The 46 contributions from authors from over 20 countries provide an overview of the achievements and experiences of different countries in disaster reduction since 1988. These contributions are presented in the volume in three parts, namely Disaster Reduction, Earthquake Hazards, and Earthquake Engineering. This text should help to shape the direction that international disaster prevention will take by identifying crucial program functions and essential institutional responsibilities in the field of disaster reduction after the IDNDR. Audience: This volume contains valuable information for seismologists, geophysicists, earth scientists, engineers, architects, and psychologists interested in earthquake hazard and seismic risk research. It should also be useful for authorities responsible for public safety and natural hazards mitigation plans, and for insurance companies.

In 1998 Armenia was commemorating the tenth anniversary of the catastrophic Spitak earthquake. The Second International Conference on "Earthquake Hazard and Seismic Risk Reduction" sponsored by the Government of the Republic of Armenia and United Nation's International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction (UN/IDNDR) was held in dedication to that event between 14-21 September (later referred to as Yerevan Conference). The Yerevan Conference has been organized by the National Survey for Seismic Protection (NSSP) of the Republic of Armenia. All level's decision-makers (from the ministers to the local authorities), politicians, scientists, leaders of the executive and legislative powers, psychologists, leading businessmen, representatives from the private sector and the media as well as from the International Organizations have been invited by the Armenian NSSP to take part in joint discussion of the Seismic Risk Reduction Problem for the first time in the history of such forums. Armenian NSSP's such initiative has been triggered by the experience of the Spitak earthquake and other disasters. They showed that it will be possible to reduce the risks, posed by the natural disaster, only through the common efforts of all the community in co-operation with the International institutions.

Earthquakes are the expression of the continuing evolution of the Earth planet and of the deformation of its crust and occur worldwide; while the largest events (M>7. 5) concentrate on plate boundary areas and active plate interiors, moderate earthquakes may take place, if rarely, in all continental areas and may turn catastrophic in areas with poor building construction practice, as tragically shown by the sequence of earthquakes striking the Caucasus region in recent years (Spitak, Armenia, 1988; Rutbar, W. Iran, 1990; Ratcha, Georgia, 1991; Erzincan, E. Turkey, 1992). Vulnerability to disaster is increasing as urbanisation and development occupy more areas that are prone to the effects of significant earthquakes. In order to minimize the loss of life, property damage and social and economic disruption caused by earthquakes, it is essential that reliable estimates of seismic hazard be available to national decision makers and engineers for land use planning and improved building design and construction. While short- and mid-term earthquake prediction may one day be able to reduce significantly the death toll of earthquakes, the environmental effects (collapse of buildings and infrastructures, disruption of the productive chain, human resettlement) can be reduced only through a long-term prevention policy in earthquake-prone areas based on the assessment of seismic hazard and risk, the implementation of safe building construction codes, the increased public awareness on natural disasters, a strategy of land-use planning taking into account the seismic hazard and the occurrence of other natural disasters.