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On 12/19/2009 11:19:17 PM UTC an earthquake of magnitude 6 and depth 15.5km has struck an highly populated area in the Northern Province (population: 1.2 million) in Malawi. GDACS estimates the likelihood for need of international humanitarian intervention to be medium (Orange alert). This earthquake can have a medium humanitarian impact since the affected region is highly populated and has medium resilience for natural disasters. The nearest populated places are Kasguli (9km), Kopa Kopa (9km), Lupembe (20km). It is a mountainous region with a maximum altitude of 2593 m.
Caution: this information is based on risk models. Whether international humanitarian aid is needed must be decided by an
expert.
This report was automatically updated by a computer on: 12/20/2009 5:08:18 AM UTC (5 hours 49 minutes after the event) Downloads: Word report, PDF report Explanation of alert calculation: Show |
Earthquake epicentre: best estimate |
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Geological map
Characteristics for this report
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Previous reports for this earthquake.
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The population in the area of this earthquake if 38 people/kmē. (Data source).
The earthquake occurred at 1h local time. At this time a day, more people are at home and therefore more vulnerable to collapsing residential buildings. During traffic hours, people can be affected by collapsing bridges and other road infrastructure.
| Population Data | ||
|---|---|---|
| Radius (km) | Population | Density (people/kmē) |
| 1 | 19 | 19 |
| 2 | 264 | 21 |
| 5 | 1711 | 21 |
| 10 | 8175 | 26 |
| 20 | 36019 | 28 |
| 50 | 298754 | 38 |
| 100 | 1181819 | 37 |
| 200 | 4897153 | 38 |
The affected region has low level of urban area (0%) and a high level of cultivated area (37.4%). In urban areas more damage can be expected than in cultivated or natural areas. (Data source)
| Radius (km) | urban areas | cultivated areas | other |
|---|---|---|---|
| 200 | 0% | 37.44% | 62.55% |
| 100 | 0% | 35.18% | 64.8% |
| 50 | 0.02% | 29.56% | 70.41% |
| 10 | 0% | 60.21% | 39.78% |
Resilience is the capacity of the population to cope with a hazard. Since much of investments in earthquake preparedness and available funds for quick response is related to household income, the GDP per capita can be used as a rough indicator of resilience.
Malawi has a GDP per capita of 156 PPP$ (Parity Purchasing Power Dollar, about 1 Euro) and is therefore part of the medium level income countries. Therefore, the earthquake happened in an area of medium resilience.
Based on the combination of 9 indicators, ECHO attributes Malawi a medium vulnerability.
| ECHO Intervention Priority Ranking for Malawi | |
|---|---|
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| Overall situation | |
| Human Development |
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| Human Poverty |
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| Exposure to Major Disasters | |
| Natural Disasters |
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| Conflicts |
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| Humanitarian effects of population movement | |
| Refugees |
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| Internally Displaced People |
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| Health and Nutrition | |
| Undernourishment |
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| Mortality rates |
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| Donor contributions | |
| Official Development assistance |
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Source ECHO Key:
Bad -
Medium -
Good -
No data | |
Both conditions for survival and conditions for delivering aid strongly depend on the current weather and temperature. The following graphs show the current and forecast weather.
Current weather conditions and forecasts at earthquake location (lat: -10.1101 - long: 33.8153) (Data source).
More detailed observations at closest weather station (Karonga): WeatherByWeb - NOAA
Landslides: The maximum slope in the area of the earthquake is 40.482%
and the maximum altitude is 2593 m. Since this is a medium
slope, the risk of earthquake induced landslides is medium.
Note, however, that the slope data is not reliable on a local scale, while
landslides depend very much on local topography, soil and meteorological
conditions. More...
The following critical infrastructure is nearby and could be affected by the earthquake:
Nuclear power plants:
There are no nuclear facilities nearby the epicenter.
Hydrodams:
There are no hydrodam facilities nearby the epicenter.
The distance to nuclear installations is evaluated based on a 1999 UN dataset containing the location of nuclear plants in the world. If plants are near and the earthquake magnitude is above 6.5, the alert is set to orange. Note that the location of plants is approximate with errors of up to 100km.
The nearest civilian airport (Karonga) is at 19km from the epicenter. Other airports are: Mzuzu (150km), Mbinga (161km), Katumbi (85km), Chelinda (49km), Chinsali (197km), Isoka (126km), Karonga (19km), Chitipa (75km), Njombe (137km), Mbeya (138km), Chunya (178km)
Ports nearby are: [None]
While we try everything to ensure accuracy, this information is purely indicative and should not be used for any decision making without alternate sources of information. The JRC is not responsible for any damage or loss resulting from the use of the information presented on this website.
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Information on this website is collected from scientific
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Population
Density near epicenter (people/km2). Image area: 6x4 decimal
degrees (approx. 650x450km2).
previous estimates: 
12/19/2009 11:19:17 PM (UTC, Universal Standard Time)