G3 - Impacts

Impacts

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www.kapowprimary.com

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©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

Earthquakes can shake buildings so much that they fall or split open. It can cost a lot to rebuild these. If people are inside, this may cause death or injury.

Earthquakes can split open roads, making it difficult for people to leave, find shelter or food and find friends and family.

Fires can start when broken gas pipes meet with an electrical spark. This can damage buildings and injure people.

The shaking of the earth can cause huge chunks of land to fall away from the hills or mountains and crush people and buildings below. If it rains, these can turn into dangerous mudslides.

Strong earthquakes can kill or hurt people. This also depends on how prepared a place is for an earthquake.

If an earthquake happens under the sea, a tsunami can occur, flooding cities. These can also harm people and destroy buildings.

When the ground shakes, all the pipes and wires underneath can burst open or be ripped apart. This means that people may not have clean water, gas or electricity in their homes.

What damage can earthquakes cause?

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Click on the cards to reveal images of the damage caused by earthquakes.

©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

How can people prepare for an earthquake?

Practise drills

Shelters

Seismometer

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Click on the images to reveal the different ways people prepare for earthquakes.

A machine that records how strong the earthquake is - its magnitude. Scientists use seismographs to predict when earthquakes will happen and try to warn people to help them prepare.

This is like a special metal box that can protect people from falling buildings around them. People can have these in their homes or nearby as shelter when there is an earthquake.

Schools and offices teach people how to react if an earthquake happens. They then practise this - a bit like a fire alarm at school!

©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

©2022 Kapow Primary

www.kapowprimary.com

Swaying structures

Rubber blocks on the bottom of buildings

Plastic in windows

Shorter buildings

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Click on the cards to learn about earthquake-proof features in buildings.

The big beams inside a building that keep it up are slightly flexible and bend when an earthquake hits instead of falling straight away.

Only the rubber bit underneath will move in the ground, and the building above will stay quite still.

Plastic windows are covered in a giant see-through sticker, so if the window breaks, the pieces are less likely to shatter and hurt someone.

If shorter buildings fall, they won’t fall as far and are likely to hurt fewer people.