Following the earthquakes in southern Turkey and northern Syria in February and Morocco in September, the government in Jordan is directing efforts to prepare the country to deal with any natural disaster.
This was evident in a meeting last month between Prime Minister Bisher Al Khasawneh and the ministries and institutions that deal with the National Construction Council, speaking on the need to “adopt approaches related to conducting surveys, and raising the level of preparedness and effective response to any emergency”, reported the daily newspaper Al Ghad.
Official action in this regard has been ongoing for many years as is indicated by announcements of updated Jordanian codes for new buildings, monitoring of buildings that are more than half a century old and the development of a modern seismic map, dividing Jordan into 35 regions with ‘contour’ lines showing the severity of earthquakes if they occur.
University of Jordan professor of geology Hassan Alfugha said, “Jordan is likely to witness an earthquake,” because of its geographical nature. The Jordanian transform fault forms the northwestern border of the Arabian plate.
Jordanian Geologists’ Syndicate president Khaled Al-Shawabkeh said, “The earthquake situation in Jordan is classified as moderate and not very active as it is in other countries and states, such as Türkiye and Morocco. Jordan is located on the Dead Sea transform fault, in which very moderate type earthquakes occur constantly.”
He said, “Jordan is located in areas with moderate seismic activity, as it constantly witnesses mild tremors on the Dead Sea Rift, with a strength of less than magnitude 4, so that the citizen does not feel them.”
He said, “In the year 2005, Jordan adopted its own building code, modern construction has become more resistant to earthquakes when compared to old construction. There are old buildings in Amman whose lifespan is almost over or has expired.”
He spoke about the necessity of placing old buildings under constant surveillance, with continuous engineering supervision and maintenance and restoration work.
Greater Amman Municipality spokesman Nasser Al-Rahmaneh said, “The municipality has an emergency plan in cases of natural disasters, which includes harnessing human resources and equipment, making the unified call centre ready to receive any calls, and harnessing the capabilities of all emergency rooms.” M