Pau Echegaray

REFORMA
MASSIVE EARTHQUAKE SHAKES MEXICO
September 20, 1985

Thousands dead, injured and left homeless

On September 19, 1985, the residents

of Mexico City were jolted awake by an
8.1-magnitude earthquake, one of the
strongest to ever hit the area.1
The P wave, or primary wave hit at
around 7:18 in the morning, lasting for
about 3 minutes, leaving 9,500 people
dead, 30,000 injured and almost
100,000 homeless. The quake seriously
affected an area of approximately
825,000 square kilometers, caused
between 3 and 4 billion U.S. dollars of
damage, and was felt by almost 20
million people.2
Mountains and volcanoes surround
Mexico City. There used to be a lake in
the valley where the city sits and now
that the water has completely drained
the type of floor under the city is a mix
between sand and dirt that is pretty
unstable and causes earthquake waves
make even more damage.
The physical impact caused 50,000 of
Mexicos 1.4 million buildings suffering
damages.

One of the most difficult tasks was locating and

identifying the bodies. Some of the bodies were
already in decomposing state, making
identification difficult and sometimes,
impossible.5
This caused distress amongst the people of
Mexico and created a big social impact. Families
demanded bodies and this just increased the
anguish in between the public.
One of the most serious problems was the
drinking water supply. Due to the damage to the

The majority of people who were

rescued from collapsed buildings
received medical care in improvised
medical stations and hospital buildings
that were left undamaged. The
damage to the telephone network was
the greatest in communications
history. 14 hundred local lines were
cut-off and long distance server was
interrupted completely.4
Landslides caused damage at
Atenquique, Jalisco and near Jala,
Colima. Rockslides were reported along
the highways in the Ixtapa area and
sand blows and ground cracks were
observed at Lazaro Cardenas.3
On the same day, at around 7:20 pm
the s waves of a secondary earthquake
with a magnitude of 7.5 hit Mexico City
one more time, aggravating the
situation and causing panic amongst
people.
Rescue teams from all around the world
helped find people even days after the
first earthquake.

pipes, more than 1 million people were left

without water.
This lack of water lead to people breaking pipes
in order to get some. 6 Later on, this lead to
people reporting stomach diseases, due to the
use of unclean water to cook and such.
Fortunately, lots of medical campaigns were put
in place and were very successful.

Pau Echegaray

Images of the great disaster

Images of the great

disaster, Mexico City,
Mexico, 1985

Citations

1- Url: http://www.nist.gov/el/disasterstudies/earthquake/earthqua...

Website Title: What Is Seismology and What Are Seismic Waves?

Article Title: What Is Seismology and What Are Seismic Waves?

Date Accessed: November 03, 2014

Title: Earthquake Mexico 1985

Website title: Earthquake Mexico 1985
Accessed on: 2014-10-24

2,3 - Website Title: Historic Earthquakes

Article Title: Historic Earthquakes
Date Accessed: November 03, 2014

Website Title: History.com

Article Title: Earthquake shakes Mexico City
Publisher: A&E Television Networks
Date Accessed: November 02, 2014

4,5,6 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjN2eR8QzDw