The 1903 Manzikert earthquake struck

Manzikert Malazgirt (; ; ), historically known as Manzikert (), is a town in Muş Province in Turkey. It is the seat of Malazgirt District.Muş Province Muş Province (; ; ) is a Provinces of Turkey, province in the east Anatolia region of Turkey (Türkiye). Its area is 8,718 km2, and its population is 399,202 (2022), down from 453,654 in 2000. The provincial capital is the city of Muş. Ano ...

eastern Turkey The Eastern Anatolia region () is a geographical region of Turkey. The most populous province in the region is Van Province. Other populous provinces are Malatya, Erzurum and Elazığ. It is bordered by the Black Sea Region and Georgia in th ...

on 28 April. Registering a

surface-wave magnitude The surface wave magnitude (M_s) scale is one of the magnitude scales used in seismology to describe the size of an earthquake. It is based on measurements of Rayleigh surface waves that travel along the uppermost layers of the Earth. This mag ...

of 7.0, the earthquake originated from a highly active

seismic zone In seismology, a seismic zone or seismic belt is an area of seismicity potentially sharing a common cause. It can be referred to as an earthquake belt as well. It may also be a region on a map for which a common areal rate of seismicity is assume ...

. It killed 3,500 people and 20,000 animals, destroyed 12,000 homes, and is now listed among Turkey's deadliest earthquakes in

recorded history Recorded history or written history describes the historical events that have been recorded in a written form or other documented communication which are subsequently evaluated by historians using the historical method. For broader world h ...

. To this day, Turkey is threatened by major earthquakes – more than 100 earthquakes over 7.0 have taken place in the country's known history.

Geology

The country of Turkey is situated on a highly active section of the Eurasian plate boundary. The country is mainly mountainous, approximately 85 percent of the country is at an elevation of or more. The entire country lies within a zone of active deformation known as the

Alpide belt The Alpide belt or Alpine-Himalayan orogenic belt,K.M. Storetvedt, K. M., ''The Tethys Sea and the Alpine-Himalayan orogenic belt; mega-elements in a new global tectonic system,'' Physics of the Earth and Planetary Interiors, Volume 62, Issues 1 ...

. This zone of

continental collision In geology, continental collision is a phenomenon of plate tectonics that occurs at Convergent boundary, convergent boundaries. Continental collision is a variation on the fundamental process of subduction, whereby the subduction zone is destroy ...

reaches from the Atlantic Ocean to the

Himalaya Mountains The Himalayas, or Himalaya ( ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the Earth's highest peaks, including the highest, Mount Everest. More than 100 peak ...

and beyond; dating back to the

Paleogene The Paleogene Period ( ; also spelled Palaeogene or Palæogene) is a geologic period and system that spans 43 million years from the end of the Cretaceous Period Ma (million years ago) to the beginning of the Neogene Period Ma. It is the fir ...

period. It has formed due to convergent movement between the

Arabian The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

, African, and

Indian Indian or Indians may refer to: Associated with India * of or related to India ** Indian people ** Indian diaspora ** Languages of India ** Indian English, a dialect of the English language ** Indian cuisine Associated with indigenous peoples o ...

continental plates and the Eurasian plate. The

Anatolian Plate The Anatolian plate is a continental tectonic plate lying under Asiatic part of Turkey, known as Anatolia. Most of the country of Turkey is located on the Anatolian plate. The plate is separated from the Eurasian plate and the Arabian plate ...

is currently being squeezed out to the west by the ongoing collision between the Arabian plate and the Eurasian plate, bounded to the southeast by the

East Anatolian Fault The East Anatolian Fault (EAF; ) is a ~700 km long major strike-slip fault zone running from eastern to south-central Turkey. It forms the transform type tectonic boundary between the Anatolian sub-plate and the northward-moving Arabian ...

and to the north by the

North Anatolian Fault The North Anatolian Fault (NAF; ) is an active right-lateral strike-slip fault in northern Anatolia, and is the transform boundary between the Eurasian plate and the Anatolian sub-plate. The fault extends westward from a junction with the Ea ...

. To the east of the junction of these two faults, the Arabian plate is in direct collision with the Eurasian plate. This area is characterised by

thrust fault A thrust fault is a break in the Earth's crust, across which older rocks are pushed above younger rocks. Thrust geometry and nomenclature Reverse faults A thrust fault is a type of reverse fault that has a dip of 45 degrees or less. I ...

ing and was the area in which the 1903 event occurred.

Damage and casualties

Among the world's deadliest earthquakes, it caused 3,500 direct fatalities. 12,000 homes were devastated. 20,000 animals (other than humans) were killed in the epicentral region of Manzikert-

Patnos Patnos (Armenian: Բադնոց, Latin transliteration: Badnoc‘ or Patnoc‘, Kurdish: Panos) is a city of Ağrı Province of Turkey on a plain surrounded by high mountains including Süphan, watered by tributaries of the Murat River. It is 8 ...

. Damage to a lesser extent reached

Erzurum Erzurum (; ) is a List of cities in Turkey, city in eastern Anatolia, Turkey. It is the largest city and capital of Erzurum Province and is 1,900 meters (6,233 feet) above sea level. Erzurum had a population of 367,250 in 2010. It is the site of an ...

and

Bitlis Bitlis ( or ; ) is a city in southeastern Turkey. It is the seat of Bitlis District and Bitlis Province.aftershock In seismology, an aftershock is a smaller earthquake that follows a larger earthquake, in Epicenter, the same area of the Mainshock, main shock, caused as the displaced Crust (geology), crust adjusts to the effects of the main shock. Large earthq ...

rocked the same region.

Threat

Major earthquakes have taken place in the region as early as 411 B.C. In the 20th century, 58 major destructive earthquakes took place – in total, they have killed more than 100,000 people, injured 150,000, and desolated approximately 420,000 homes and buildings. More than 100 earthquakes of magnitude 7 or greater have taken place in the country historically.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Manzikert 1903 1903 Manzikert

1903 Events January * January 1 – Edward VII is proclaimed Emperor of India. * January 10 – The Aceh Sultanate was fully annexed by the Dutch forces, deposing the last sultan, marking the end of the Aceh War that have lasted for al ...

1903 in the Ottoman Empire 1903 disasters in Asia 20th-century disasters in the Ottoman Empire 1903 earthquakes

April 1903

Geology

Damage and casualties

Threat

See also

References