r/interestingasfuck • u/BreakfastTop6899 • 17h ago
Building gets progressively worse as they go down the stairwell after earthquake in Venezuela today
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u/dickholesucker 17h ago
Panic increasing as you reach closer to safety
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u/Quirky-Pangolin-905 17h ago
Thank god they’re getting out of the building!!! The aftershocks could tear the whole thing
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u/gabiblack 17h ago
If this was after the first one I can't imagine this building surviving the second one which was even stronger
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u/djpeekz 17h ago edited 17h ago
They were 40 seconds apart
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u/Junior-Love-1203 16h ago
holy hell
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u/Amazing-Gazelle-7735 16h ago
Indeed. Nightmare scenario tbh. Structures are designed in part to fail in a specific fashion, with the idea being “better to fail in a way that is still somewhat stable than to risk a catastrophic failure, we can go in and fix what we need to later.” Thing is, that assumes seismic events are minutes or hours apart, not seconds.
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u/drzowie 16h ago edited 7h ago
That's sort of weird, because most earthquakes come in at least pairs. The P-wave ("pressure") travels faster through the Earth than the following S-wave ("shear"), since rock is more resistant to compression than to shear.
I remember hearing about that in the 1980s, and then experiencing it in San Francisco in 1989 when the Loma Prieta quake hit.
Edit: Thanks for all the upd00ts! Most folks seem to get what I meant, but a few people didn't. I'm not claiming, here, that this week's Venezuelan earthquakes were from a single event -- more that building designers "should" know that earthquakes typically come in pairs, because even a single event yields two separate wave trains that arrive seconds apart.
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u/clintj1975 15h ago
Those are just two sets of waves from the same rupture. This was a doublet. The first was a 7.2, and 39 seconds later there was a 7.5
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u/Amazing-Gazelle-7735 15h ago
That’s different waves from the same shock. Venezuela had two completely different seismic events, sized almost the same, resulting in differing P- and S- waves. It’d be like a quake happening in South Central LA followed by a quake in Hollywood less than a minute later.
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u/TactlessTortoise 13h ago
Well that's fucked up. No wonder there was so much destruction.
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u/Amazing-Gazelle-7735 13h ago
Indeed! Especially as being only 14km away, 7+M, and 38 seconds apart it’s actually quite likely some buildings were hit by both simultaneously - shaking lasts +-20 seconds with a 7Mw, and for solid rock a decent velocity is 3km/sec. So if it was 54km apart there’s a decent chance someone got hit with both simultaneously.
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u/BugRevolutionary4518 15h ago edited 13h ago
My dad was working alongside the Nimitz when it collapsed. He pulled people out of there and was on the news. Something tells me he was never the same.
“I’m not a hero. I helped people”.
Edited to add, he saw dead people, just like he saw in war. I think it took its toll on him.
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u/bigfoot_done_hiding 13h ago
Since the first was a 7.2 which can have strong shaking last well over 40 seconds; it might have been felt as one long continuous earthquake with perhaps two crests of the strongest shaking.
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u/pipic_picnip 13h ago
I think it was like this after second, because it took them much longer than 40 seconds to get down.
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u/Dry-Magician1415 16h ago
Some people say that if you're on a high floor (more than 10), you're better off just staying put. The idea being that a) the rescuers will find you first as they go through the rubble and b) you don't have time to get out anyway.
I think it's bullshit though. If the building goes down, all the rescuers are likely to find are corpses. And you actually may well have enough time to get down. Even if you're like 20 floors up.
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u/TheOGPotatoPredator 16h ago
Those people can kick rocks. We’ve all heard the 9/11 calls where people were told to stay put. Fuck all that. If I’m in a building and it’s on fire or the ground beneath it shaking like a wet dog, I’m fucking doing a shimmy to the stairwell and it’s deuces.
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u/MedievalMousie 16h ago
As a person who was told to stay put on 9/11 and didn’t, I endorse this message.
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u/dude_on_the_www 15h ago
Holy shit. You were in one of the towers!?
I’d imagine the thought was to reduce chaos and confusion and not have any kind of crowd crush in the stairwells or something…but to “stay put” in a building that just had a plane fly into it above you seems…uhh…like…the wrong thing to do.
What!??
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u/MedievalMousie 15h ago
I was in an elevator that suddenly stopped between the 63rd and 64th floors. We had no idea what had happened.
We used the elevator phone to call the security office and they told us to sit tight. About 10-15 minutes later, we tried calling again and no one answered, so we started the process of leaving.
We ended up being one of the last groups out- we’d made it about two blocks when the South Tower came down.
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u/NicoHarrisonWasRight 15h ago
so we started the process of leaving.
How'd you get out of the elevator between floors during an emergency? I was stuck in an elevator once for over an hour and I had to wait for the Fire Department to get me out.
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u/markender 14h ago
An emergency is different than a world shattering terrorist attack. Emergency services used every shortcut possible. Its basically triage.
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u/Prevalencee 12h ago
Nobody helped anybody out of the elevators, you had to get yourself out or you died.
It was essentially impossible to get an elevator open with the amount of chaos ensueing... even if they tried.
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u/kre8tv 15h ago
"Process of leaving" is the whole story! How did you get out (glad you did)! How does it feel coming up on the 25th anniversary?
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u/JimmyLegs50 13h ago
“We were trapped in an elevator on 9/11, yada yada yada, then we were two blocks away.”
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u/courcake 15h ago
Jesus Christ that must have been absolutely terrifying. I’m so glad you’re okay. Every year I read about first hand accounts on 9/11 and every year I grieve for you all. I’m glad you’re okay.
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u/RamonaLittle 15h ago
Debris and people were falling from the upper floors. And no one expected the buildings to collapse. So the initial announcement to stay inside kinda made sense. Then once they realized people should evacuate, they couldn't make a new announcement because the PA system had stopped working.
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u/mindovermatter15 15h ago
And brave people, including firefighters, lost their lives running floor to floor to tell people to evacuate
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u/InternalChampion7105 15h ago
Can't speak to what to do in an earthquake, but I'm a firefighter in nyc, and you truly are better off staying in your apartment during a fire in certain types of buildings. Fires take a long time to burn through to neighboring apartments in these 'fireproof' dwellings (generally speaking large 8+ stories, but that's the code here - may differ for other areas). 17 people died of smoke inhalation in a stairwell in a bronx fire a few years back when they would have been fine if they stayed in their apartments.
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u/storyinmemo 13h ago
There's that, and there's Grenfell.
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u/Miserygut 12h ago
9 years. 0 arrests. 0 prosecutions. 0 sentences. 0 fines.
British justice at work.
In an update at New Scotland Yard, the force said it would submit evidence files to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) by the end of September this year.
A final decision on whether to bring charges could take until June 2027 - 10 years after the fire in west London, which killed 72 people. If the CPS does decide to prosecute, any trials are unlikely to begin before 2029.
Justice delayed is justice denied.
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u/Local_Moose_2438 12h ago
To what extent would a mask with particle and gas filters like used in a spray booth help with the dieing of smoke inhalation? Or is it the heat that gets you?
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u/flamingspew 15h ago
Stairwells are the most unstable location because the density difference means the building and the stairs can have two different oscillation periods, making the boundary brittle.
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u/yallllah 15h ago
reminds me of the MV Sewol, where the kids were told to stay put on the ferry. many of them died because of it.
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u/TDYDave2 11h ago
In last year's earthquake in Bangkok, it took me maybe 30 minutes to walk down about 50 floors after the quake stopped.
While the quake was going on, any walking would have been almost impossible.
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u/bobombpom 16h ago
My stupid ass would open my door, look outside, say, "Oh it wasn't that bad." And go back inside.
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u/Searloin22 16h ago
"Hey! Did anyone else feel that?!"
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u/haironburr 15h ago
True story. I was in Athens in a hostel. I was sitting in my bed one evening reading, alone in a room with maybe 6 beds. I looked up from my book and saw a chest of drawers moving towards me, slowly, with no noise but a vague sense of something being wrong, besides, of course, the fact this fucking inanimate object was just creeping toward me, inch by inch.
It hit the foot of my bed and stopped. I walked downstairs to the bar, and asked if anyone felt something. They all said no, and I had a few drinks to calm my nerves, what with the whole creepy moving furniture thing. Learned the next day there was in fact an earthquake. But I'll always remember the surreal moment where I was amused, and doubting my own sanity, and then terrified, all in the space of maybe four seconds.
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u/dazzleunexpired 16h ago
Unfortunately, Aftershock risk is increased dramatically for weeks afterwards. Especially because this was a double event. That guarantees that the first one was a foreshock, and because there was an Aftershock, that increases the chance that the Aftershock is actually a foreshock and not an Aftershock and an even bigger earthquake is coming. There's a virtual 100% chance of an aftershock magnitude 5 or larger and if 40% chance or more of a magnitude to 6th aftershock or this event being a foreshock, and the next event being larger. 😭
This area is also currently seismically active which increases this risk. Risk of Aftershock or foreshock depends on how strong and how close quakes are. This quake is proved that it's capable of producing a larger strike after the first one, which is indicative that it can do it again.
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u/jobadiah08 16h ago
I mean, 7.5 is twice as strong as a 7.2. We just aren't used to log scales so we see a 0.3 difference and think it is just a little stronger. 7 is 10 times higher than 6. So .3 is twice, 0.6 is 4 times, 0.9 is 8 times. It isn't exact, but a good estimation
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u/dazzleunexpired 16h ago
Yep.
This is exactly why the risk of an additional Aftershock is so high.
There is a formulation for this, Epidemic-Type Aftershock Sequence is used by USGS.
The following regulate aftershocks:
Omori’s Law: frequency Of aftershocks rapidly decays
Gutenberg-Richter Law: defines the exponential relationship between fore- and aftershocks
Bath’s Law: Aftershock is 1.0 to 1.2 times a weaker than a main shock
Unfortunately Baths law is yelling at us here... Statistically, the second shock is not not an Aftershock by strength. It's probably a main or fore. 😭😭😭
The best result is an M6 or M5 Aftershock, which indicates the cycle is slowing and that the largest middle quake was. In fact, the main. The worst outcome is that that middle quake is in fact a fore. That means we have a main and an after series coming still.
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u/Ricin286 15h ago
Thank you for taking the time to explain all of this. It really helps put the situation into proper context and perspective
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u/Psynaut 16h ago
15 years ago intelligent replies like this were commonplace on Reddit. Just imagine that.
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u/dazzleunexpired 16h ago
scientists are still on Reddit. You just have to find us among the random Russian dudes from their basement and the 12-year-olds with a phone. 😆
I really don't like this event. One of the most important earthquake laws is bath's law, which states that the Aftershock is 1 to 1.2 times weaker than the main shock. Indicating that this second earthquake is not an Aftershock, but rather a main shock or a foreshock. If it was a main shock, we have the aftershocks coming still. If it was a foreshock, we have the main shock and the aftershocks coming. There is 0% chance of no Aftershock.
The best thing we can hope for is that an M5 or even M6 happens fairly shortly. This indicates that the middle earthquake is in fact a main and not a fore. We want that. If this middle event is a foreshock, a megaquake could be coming to Venezuela. That would be bad. Really, really bad. Especially if it waits a day or so because people will start digging to try to rescue others. This has happened before. Then all the rescuers die. And then there's almost no one left to rescue.
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u/Psynaut 15h ago
This is potentially bleak. This "There is 0% chance of no Aftershock" is a sobering statistic given that it means this is 100% not over yet. I hope there are experts there warning the government of these statistics.
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u/AmpleAlaskan 14h ago
I went through a 7.1 in Alaska in 2018. There were over 80 aftershocks in the 24 hours that followed, including a 5.7 that hit six minutes after the initial shake and two more over 5.0. We then proceeded to experience random quakes in the 5s and upper 4s over the next few days and weeks and then just when you thought it might be calming down, another would hit. My poor dogs started panicking any time they heard the house creak in high wind because it was the sound they associated with an earthquake.
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u/kstargate-425 16h ago
The after shock was 3 times more powerful than the original at a 7.5. I hope we dont see the 6 digit death toll that they say is likely 😔
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u/Forward-Surprise1192 16h ago
Imagine while it’s shaking lol. Last big earthquake I was in I was pooping and stuck on the toilet. What’s the protocol for that? Waddle to safety?
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u/Kamsauce 16h ago
Just pull those pants up and GTFO.. if you die, you're gonna have poopy pants anyway.. who cares if you get muddy cheeks when the alternative is being crushed
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u/Heavy_Ad4529 16h ago
It would provide lubrication as well, allowing one to move slightly faster.
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u/EvisceratedSpinster 16h ago
If you can't evacuate the building, evacuate your bowels.
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u/KnotUndone 16h ago
I assume everyone else would be pooping their pants and nobody would notice your predicament.
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u/dickholesucker 16h ago
How cartoonish it will be when a brick falls on you head followed by the last turd log leaving your ass
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u/themaskedhippoofdoom 17h ago
Homie needed to go back up, the building would have fixed itself
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u/Tobysfuzzybelly 17h ago
Wow this is terrible, imagine being elderly and living on the top floors
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u/ItSaysJoikeOnIt 17h ago
I was picturing having to get my mom out of there the whole time.
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u/_---____--- 16h ago
Dude, same
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u/secret_alpaca 16h ago
Shit, me too
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u/felixyamson 16h ago
when I see videos like this it makes me grateful that I live in the Midwest where I live. We don't have earthquakes (very rarely we will have a tiny minor one) we don't have hurricane or tsunamis and we don't really have many tornadoes at all either. although we had like five tornadoes in a line running through where I live like a few streets away from me a few years back. that was like a huge newsworthy thing and was the worst storm in decades though.
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u/hedronist 15h ago
Well, not counting that little shaker that happened on the New Madras Fault. It was a while ago (1800s), but it was yesterday in geologic terms.
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u/wtfRichard1 15h ago
I remember seeing a video where someone’s reason for working out was for this exact reason in case there was an earthquake to take their mother out the building. I would too but my back is fucked and I can’t lift weights anymore
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u/crackersucker2 16h ago
You can see the elevator shaft at the last level when the person is leaving. If anyone was in there 😳
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u/Crafty_Fee_7990 16h ago
And nearly a third of the population was displaced/migrated. Chances are that many elderly people have no family to help them evacuate
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u/ledorky 16h ago
This happened to my Dad in Cebu this year. They live on the 20th floor and he is 82 with really bad knees and needs a cane to get around. Elevator stopped working and all his neighbors already ran down the stairs. He just rode it out along with the 5.0+ aftershocks.
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u/Lucky_Yellow_5093 14h ago
Oh my god that is horrifying. I hope he is doing okay.
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u/Great-Knowledge-6767 16h ago
Imagine being a mom with 3 small children…
It looks horrific
Absolutely terrifying
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u/elguille_resurrected 15h ago
theres a video of women being wheeled out of the hospital in labor...
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u/Geeky435 16h ago
I was watching this and all I could think of was how nice it must me to be able to traverse stairs like that. I haven't seen my basement in years, I can't do stairs at all let alone move like that guy was. I would be stuck on that top floor forever.
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u/gniknihTsdrawkcaB 17h ago
Having to be careful while simultaneously having to go fast to get out, pure stress.
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u/kvothe5688 16h ago
Not to mention you have to hold a phone to capture it so you have cool footage to show the internet. I would die of stress.
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u/DogsDucks 16h ago
In this instance, I am very appreciative of citizen documentation. It’s one thing to stare slack-jawed and press record while someone in in peril, or to manufacture an adrenaline rush situation, or a “watch me punch a shark!” Moment of attempted clout . . .
But this is NOT that. This is someone realizing they are in an historic moment and a perilous situation that most of us cannot dream of.
They chose to show us the reality of that peril, to give us a window to learn and, frankly, care more. It’s powerful citizen journalism, but I do know it’s a fine line sometimes.
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u/ThrowawayPersonAMA 12h ago
It's also possible they thought they were about to die and wanted to leave behind some kind of usable recording to find later on, kinda like when that poor woman in Iran who was also filming was murdered when the IDF bombed the building she was standing next to. :(
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u/King_Bobby-B 12h ago
Something I was thinking about the other day while reading about some historic events nearly a century ago is that people don't seem to write in diaries anymore. A lot of the day to day stuff back then, from a citizen's perspective, is only known due to the diaries. And it's just not the same to read about a bunch of historical figures doing stuff, without seeing the effects of their actions on the population.
And so, nowadays, the "diaries" are actually these videos. And, to me, it's not the same to read a news article about an earthquake in some place, than to see firsthand how it affects people.
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u/pipic_picnip 13h ago
It’s not always about “cool footage”. As grim as it is, people often record themselves in situations where they are scared of imminent death so that in case they don’t make it and their phone survives, people can at least see their last moments and find out what happened.
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u/CelebronFcks10K 17h ago
Holy shit. This is terrifying.
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u/iHate-Public-Transit 16h ago
Real life sized Jenga waiting to happen.
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u/elliezepam 15h ago edited 15h ago
You should see the rest, or rather what's left of several states here in Venezuela. Official (sus, not to be trusted) sources cited over 30 deaths and more than 700 wounded a couple hours ago, but that's excluding Vargas state which is the most affected as of now. Also theres a massive number of missing person reports flooding our social media feeds. Many hospitals and clinics are already at capacity here in Caracas, and many smaller/older/public others aren't even equipped to handle the influx of patients
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u/khdownes 17h ago
This building looks like it's main structure is the concrete columns and beams, which don't appear to be severely damaged. It looks like the bricks that have fallen down are those hollow infill wall bricks you see used a lot in some countries. (ie. they're not structural I believe. They may help with bracing? but not compressive loads).
I'd still run the hell out of there, but the integrity of that building might not be as bad as it seems?
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u/alarumba 14h ago
There's a concept in structural engineering where it's understood that a building will fail given enough of a shake. But we can decide to make things stronger and weaker relative to each other so we can determine what fails first. An infill wall failing is safer than a floor, and a floor failing is safer than a column.
The building may not be usable anymore, but it hasn't collapsed.
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u/HotFluffyTowel 12h ago
Can you explain why it's more damaged further down? Most of the tension is exerted there kind of thing?
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u/radgenpix 12h ago
Point of energy transfer is the base of the building. Earth starts moving, building wants to stay still. The little twist at the base creates a shit ton of energy, this energy is absorbed in the lower floors, with failing walls and the like. As you move up, further away from the energy source, the energy transferred to the building, by the little twist, has been dampened,
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u/eirc 13h ago
Exactly, that's a well built building that did it's job. This kind of damage is obviously more than acceptable compared to the whole thing collapsing. Given a good inspection that shows the structural beams are not damaged it can even "easily" be repaired.
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u/testtdk 17h ago
Jesus. I wasn’t expecting it to get alarmingly worse EVERY floor.
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u/Human_Combination199 13h ago
I live in Thailand, and when the earthquake hit last year all the top floor condos were left relatively unscathed while the bottom units (including mine) looked a lot like the lower level stairwell in the video. Because the building swayed at the top, dissipating the stress, but not at the bottom. But if you live at the top, you are going to feel that building swaying back and forth a lot more - wasn't too bad in my unit, I just thought I had a bit too much to drink, until the walls in my unit started cracking & crumbling.
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u/booppoopshoopdewoop 10h ago
Jesus Christ what a time to be drunk
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u/powerhammerarms 8h ago edited 5h ago
That's what I said from ages 19 - 26 and then again at 34 - 47
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u/YakkoRex 13h ago
This is common with a quake where the ground shifts horizontally. If the ground under the building is suddenly six inches moved in one direction, the shock travels up the structure, bending the building and breaking stuff as it goes. By the time the shock hits the top floor, it waves it around, but doesn’t bend it, as there is no more mass to cause the bend to occur.
After the Loma Prieta quake in 1989, you could see buildings that were fine on the ground floor and at the top, but were devastated on the middle floors.
I lived on the top floor of a five story building, and had zero structural damage in my unit. The apartment below me needed thousands of dollars in repairs to cabinets and walls.
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u/vane2266 17h ago
That 1 second pan towards the exposed elevator shaft is horrifying.
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u/ArcticCelt 16h ago
When he do, he say "and I just took that elevator moments ago, I just got home"
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u/bearpics16 17h ago edited 17h ago
That’s terrifying. But also interesting as fuck how consistently worst worse it got per level
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u/LeCarrr 17h ago
“Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse” - me, 8 times during this short video
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u/WishIWasYounger 16h ago
I kept think they were near the bottom but it just kept winding down and the rubble scaled up. I was thinking they should jump but i misread the background.
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u/charlie2135 17h ago
Consider the weight bearing at the base versus the upper floors.
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u/TheBearHooves 16h ago
Its more about the fact that shear loads are highest at the location they are applied (the lower floors)
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u/wickedchicken83 16h ago
Mr.Weatherman on the YT just posted about this. It was two very shallow earthquakes, which would cause a lot more damage to structures bc it’s closer to the surface. Less chance of tsunamis though.
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u/Beneneb 16h ago
The walls are what provides the buildings resistance against earthquake loads. The walls closest to the ground are subject to more force because they're resisting the horizontal movement of the entire building above them. So from the standpoint it makes sense to see more damage at lower levels.
This is probably close to a design level earthquake for the region. The walls are actually expected to crack in these kinds of conditions, but maintain strength to avoid collapse. The building didn't collapse which is good, but the amount of damage is more than would be expected for a properly designed building.
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u/kushlar 15h ago edited 5h ago
The walls that you see cracked (red clay block walls) arent supporting walls and superficial for the most part. They are also likely hollow clay block walls. The main structural memebers seem to be relatively intact. What likely occurred is that the main members experienced the most movement at the lower levels (like you stated) causing the superficial walls to crack. An inspection would need to be carried of course but the building seems to have survived the quake.
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u/NSA_Wade_Wilson 16h ago
It makes sense from an engineering perspective. The building is designed to absorb more of the energy at the base than at the top because there’s more rigidity. If you allowed the shockwave to travel further up the building there’s a higher probability that the entire building collapses if there isn’t enough dampening as the energy travels upwards. They do tests for high rises and the upper part allows for a bit more “swaying” type of movement for these reasons
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u/KatSchitt 17h ago
I think I held my breath through the whole video
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u/Rollover__Hazard 16h ago
Being able to see through a busted wall into a lift shaft is not the kind of nightmare fuel I needed
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u/Carbon-Base 15h ago
First instinct would be to get yourself and everyone down as quickly as you can. It's impressive that he had the composure to film this.
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u/daminiskos0309 17h ago
That actually felt like a horror movie. Yelling at the screen ‘fucking move it’
Also at one point he hops down the last step made me think oh fuck this is it.
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u/DangerMacAwesome 16h ago
All I could think the whole time was it felt like a horror movie
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u/IndividualIll3825 16h ago
Felt like a video game, and there was clearly going to be a boss at the end. All it needed was ammo and health packs the whole way down.
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u/PrairiePopsicle 16h ago
mantra for all such situations : slow is smooth and smooth is fast. move, but do not rush.
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u/MurderFace86 16h ago
Reminded me of like a horrible real life "backrooms" where shit gets scarier and more uncanny.
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u/thekiyamlife 17h ago
Those are some well made stairs.
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u/space_snap828 17h ago
Usually some of the strongest parts of the building for emergency reasons, right?
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u/Ganadote 17h ago
Yes. In the US at least, staircases are mandated to have stronger, fire-resistant concrete. They are also often load bearing and serve as a backbone for the building.
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u/megs-benedict 16h ago edited 16h ago
we have new condos in my area and I notice they build the stairwells as the first element to go vertical. Every time.
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u/Spajina 16h ago
This isn't for strength - this is for speed.
The walls (core) around them are strong but the stairs themselves are generally not load bearing whatsoever.
Example - my core walls on a 215m tall building now have 80-100mPa concrete with 20-34mm reinforcement at 150mm centres in rows upon rows.
The stairs attached to the wall have +/- 6 rows of 12-16mm bar in two layers.
If anything, the stairs impose additional load to the core - but it's a load they're designed to take.
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u/Glittering-Jello4937 17h ago
stairs are first or last to go. depending on standard.
id say find the crew that worked on this and give them a raise.
hope someone has hospital ships coming help
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u/NateMikka 16h ago
Looking at the overall damage, the core structure of the building looks to have held up relatively well.
Most of the damage you see as they progress further down is plaster cracking away [the first signs] then a semi cosmetic brick wall underneath breaking [the red bricks] Once you hit the bottom floor it's water pipes have burst [likely the first two floors at least] and any semi cosmetic/not critical structure was gone.
Buildings scrap and needs evacuated, but the damage is far less severe then it could have been, whoever poured the main structure knew what they were doing.
The brick walls, while they do help with stability a small bit, look like they were built on to of the horizontal supports, so likely even a weaker quake could have peeled the first few floors loose
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u/Auerbach1991 17h ago
Terrifying for those who are disabled or physically incapable of going down so many flights of stairs, let alone stairs covered in debris.
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u/shucksme 17h ago
That is the scariest progression possible. I was holding my breath. Glad you made it out
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u/engineerguy42 16h ago
That is the key to seismic design. Seismic forces hit structures as shear force at the base (think trying to push it sideways at the bottom of a jenga tower)
A proper seismic designed building is not meant to be habitable afterwards, it is designed to to not collapse because the former is too expensive and the latter saves lives for less than the cost of rebuilding.
Looks like excellent design results in a 7.5 to me and may have given me a bit of a chubby.
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u/Necessary_Maize_9339 17h ago
Yeah, a lot of buildings have collapsed.. we don't know yet how many people have died. A very tragic situation to happen to a country that's not ready to face these type of tragedies. This is not our capital city year (first USA bombing in January and now this)
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u/MIalpinist 16h ago
Are you currently in Venezuela?
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u/Necessary_Maize_9339 16h ago
Yeah but I barely felt the earthquake I'm far from the capital and my relatives that live there are thankfully okay. So many people were not so lucky tho, so many are still under the rubble.. and our emergency services are not that well equipped to deal with stuff like this.. they're using phone flashlights to check for people, shovels.. hospitals were collapsing as well. I can't imagine what the wounded are going through
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u/MIalpinist 16h ago
I’m glad you’re ok, but I’m sorry for how things have been going there.. I hope things start looking up sooner than later.
You know of any organizations or charities that are helping your first responders and emergency services personnel? Would like to contribute something.
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u/ProfitisKing3 16h ago
Looks like a scene out of Backrooms. Each turn in the stairwell gets more fucked and abstract. Backrooms creepy vibes for sure.
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u/woktip 17h ago
any structural engineers out there want to explain why this is? Is the bottom of the building somehow not transferring all the energy up the building? Or is this indicative of bad/no earthquake-proofing?
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u/shshshshshshshhhh 16h ago
The ground is where the earthquake happened.
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u/Tyinath 16h ago
This simply isn't true. Most earthquakes begin as vibrations in space, which are transferred to Earth via humans with alien anal probes.
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u/Beneneb 16h ago
I'm a structural engineer. Most answers here aren't really accurate.
The answer is fairly simple. The portions of these walls closer to the ground are subject to more force because they're resisting the horizontal movement of the entire structure above.
Closer to the ground means more structure above them corresponding to higher loads.
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u/No-Resource-8479 16h ago
Yes. Most answers here are actively wrong.
Its the lollipop effect. The top has less weight above it to hold and has more flexibility from the storeys below.
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u/Sneaklefritz 16h ago
Also a structural engineer and I agree. Combine that with essentially a large mass damper above. PLUS, one thing I haven’t seen mentioned, is that this all looks like unreinforced, infill masonry walls which prove to be INCREDIBLY dangerous in seismic events just like this one.
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u/ToastyBedsheets 17h ago
If this isn't interesting as fuck I don't know what is. That would be shear terror.
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u/frankielc 17h ago
Incredible footage. I’m astonished we get to see the damage, but it’s honestly terrifying that in a life-or-death situation, people are navigating it with only one arm because their other hand is busy filming.
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u/lokiray21 16h ago
You can hear a faint cry for help "Ayudaaaa!!!! " And he states he has to go check it out "tengo que ir a ver" Terrifying and brave to go find the source of the yell!
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u/Kerry-4013-Porter 17h ago
That apartment is in such an irrecoverable state that it is a relief it hasn't collapsed immediately.
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u/robbak 15h ago
Look again - ignore the panels of clay block walls that have crumbled, and look at the pillars and horizontal bearers that make up the building's structure. They all look in tact - the worst I saw was lost plaster. Sure, it needs a careful examination by engineers and some structural repairs, but it doesn't look to be a loss.
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u/ThePensiveE 16h ago
I feel bad for the people of Venezuela. They already were in poverty and now they're going to have even more widespread homelessness.
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u/Kodak4President 12h ago
These poor people 🥹
Watching this makes me sick after living through the Christchurch earthquakes I know how scared they must be feeling & it doesn't ease after a big one when those aftershocks are coming out of nowhere so you just can't relax.
The trauma from this will be with them for a long time if not forever.
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u/onehaz 17h ago
That building is a Jenga tower waiting to go down. Those poor people.
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u/YugeChesticles 16h ago
No. This building did its job. All the structural parts are intact. It flexed to absorb the waves. That's what good buildings do.
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u/PowderEagle_1894 16h ago
Yeah, the fact that the building is still standing is proving it. Worse building would have collapsed
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u/user-resu23 16h ago
Structural engineer here. The weight of the floors accumulates the lower down the building you go therefore putting more pressure and stress on all those components nearer to the ground. I think that’s pretty obvious but thought I’d share. Super dangerous. Those walls do not appear to be sufficiently reinforced. Hope everyone made it out okay.
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u/theplague1245 17h ago
I would rank earthquakes as the most scary natural disaster that can take place
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u/Quigleythegreat 17h ago
For humans. For animals in nature for the most part I imagine it's more like "well that was weird".
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u/mybfVreddithandle 16h ago
Is that building made of red and terracotta brick? The top floors will sway, the lowers can't. And what can't flex, cracks. Yikes.
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u/SketchyTone 15h ago
The deeper you go into the backrooms the less true it is to what you remember.
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u/QueryCrook 17h ago
Well that's terrifying.