Some implications of the 1985 Mexican earthquake for hazard assessment

The 1985 Mexican earthquake ranks amongst the major earthquake disasters of the twentieth century. One of the few positive aspects of the disaster is that it provided massive quantities of data concerning seismic effects and earthquake damage. Every opportunity should be taken to incorporate the findings from these data into earthquake hazard and risk assessments. The purpose of this paper is to summarise some important lessons from the earthquake, paying particular attention to their implications for seismic regions of the Third World. The paper arises from field investigations conducted by the author on the behalf of reinsurance companies. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.