Bachau

Bachau is a town of about 35,000 people located near the earthquake epicenter. Construction in the town consisted of unreinforced masonry and reinforced concrete construction. The morphology of the area suggests regions within the town that are underlain by soil and other areas underlain by rock. The damage in both areas was nearly complete, with more than 90% of all buildings suffering at least partial collapse.

Figure 1: View of typical destruction in unreinforced masonry construction (2/14/01 13:05:55, N 23.29480 E 70.33827).

Figure 2: Collapsed reinforced concrete residential structure. (2/14/01 13:07:05, N23.29490 E70.33929).

Figure 3: Close up view of beam-column connection in structure from Figure 2, showing poor reinforcement detail (2/14/01 13:07:23, N23.29490 E70.33929).

Figure 4: Soft story collapse of reinforced concrete structure (2/14/01 13:20:12, N23.29512 E70.34133).

Figure 5: View of destruction on hillside, both flat land and hillside construction was nearly completely leveled throughout the town (2/14/01, 13:32:40, N23.29428 E70.34434).