National Information Centre of Earthquake Engineering at IIT Kanpur, INDIA
2022 Doti Earthquake: Nepal experiences yet another jolt!
[This brief report is compiled by Prof. Hemant B Kaushik and Graduate student Manjeet Khadka, IIT Guwahati, with inputs from the Internet and media coverage of the event.]
While the rehabilitation and retrofitting efforts in Nepal are still ongoing after the devastating earthquakes of 2015, another big earthquake struck western Nepal in the early hours of Nov 9, 2022 at 2:12 am (local time). The earthquake epicenter was located in the Khaptad National Park of the sparsely populated Doti district, 20 km east of the district headquarters Dipayal Silgadhi and 430 km west of Nepal's capital, Kathmandu. During this event, six villagers, including four children, reportedly were killed due to the collapse of stone and mud houses in rural areas. The strong tremors were also felt in several neighbouring Indian cities as far as New Delhi, some 536 km southwest, and people were awakened; however, no damage was reported.
The event was recorded by several seismological centres across the world. The National Earthquake Monitoring & Research Center (NEMRC) of Nepal measured the local magnitude as 6.6 with its epicenter at 29.38° N and 81.13° E and focal depth of 10 km (Figure 1). The National Center for Seismology of India measured the magnitude of the earthquake as 6.3 with the epicenter at 29.24° N, 81.06° E and focal depth of 10 km. On the other hand, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reported the epicenter of the earthquake at 29.274° N and 81.149° E, with a magnitude of 5.7 and a depth of around 18.1 km. Two foreshocks preceded the main shock in the same region on Nov 8, 2022 (same night): a 5.7 magnitude tremor was recorded at 9.07 pm and another 4.1 magnitude tremor at 9.56 pm (NEMRC). A large number of small aftershocks have struck the region after the mainshock.
Figure 1: Epicenter of 2022 Doti, Nepal earthquake (Source: NEMRC, Nepal)
According to the newspaper reports, besides the death of 6 people, 5 are missing, 12 are seriously injured and hundreds are displaced. Nearly 10 houses collapsed completely and cracks developed in a large number of houses at Gaira Gaun in Purichauki Rural Municipality (Figure 2). In 2015, two devastating earthquakes rocked Nepal, killing nearly 9,000 people, wounding nearly 22,000 others, and damaging over 800,000 houses and school buildings. [www.nicee.org/Nepal.html]
Figure 2: Several random rubble masonry houses collapsed and large number of houses suffered severe damage at Gaira Gaun in Purichauki Rural Municipality in Doti District of Western Nepal