{"id":16461,"date":"2015-10-15T06:55:27","date_gmt":"2015-10-15T06:55:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/?p=16461"},"modified":"2015-10-15T06:55:27","modified_gmt":"2015-10-15T06:55:27","slug":"karachi-landslide-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/2015\/10\/15\/karachi-landslide-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Karachi rockfall: a human-induced tragedy?"},"content":{"rendered":"
Karachi rockfall<\/h5>\n

On Tuesday a rockfall occurred in a slum<\/a> at Block 1 of the Gulistan-e-Jauhar area<\/span> on the outskirts of Karachi, in Sindh Province, Pakistan.\u00a0 The landslide buried three small houses, crushing them completely and killing 13 people, including seven children. \u00a0 The National has a gallery of images<\/a> showing the site of the landslide, including this one:<\/p>\n

\"Karachi<\/a>

Karachi landslide via the National<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

.<\/p>\n

A daytime image, also from the National<\/a>, indicates what happened in Karachi:<\/p>\n

\"Karachi<\/a>

Karachi landslide via the National<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

.<\/p>\n

It is clear that\u00a0 the toe of the slope has been extensively cut by a mechanical excavator – note the vertical scratches.\u00a0 The upper part of the slope has not been cut – I would guess that it was too high for the excavator to reach – leaving a large overhang.\u00a0 To the side of the landslide scar is a vertical joint that probably played a role in releasing the blocks.\u00a0 Note that the next section of the cliff, directly above the rescue workers, is highly dangerous.\u00a0 Thus, the indications are that this is a human-induced disaster.<\/p>\n

Geo TV provides more information<\/a> about the slope cutting:<\/p>\n

Most land plots in the hilly area of Block 1 of Gulistan-e-Jauhar where the disaster occurred, measure 400 sq yards.\u00a0 The possible reason for the incident could be the attempt to increase the plots size to 800 sq yards.\u00a0 The process involved digging into the hill at its base, leading to its collapse, and a consequent landslide.\u00a0 Geologist, University of Karachi, Shamim Sheikh said the incident took place as a result of the digging into the hill at its base.<\/p>\n

The plot where the incident occurred actually belongs to Ayaz Soomro, who is presently a member of Sindh Assembly and a leader of Pakistan People\u2019s Party (PPP).\u00a0 Ayaz, son of Khuda Bakhsh Soomro, had received the plot number 64\/13 in 1995.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Note that in the adjacent plot, visible in the first image above, the slope has been reinforced.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A rockfall in Karachi on Tuesday killed 13 people including seven children. Images of the site hint that there may be a human cause of the tragedy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":16463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[123,959,10,56,72,120],"class_list":["post-16461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-landslide-report","tag-city","tag-landslide-report","tag-pakistan","tag-rockfall","tag-south-asia","tag-urban"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.agu.org\/landslideblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}