Life-time
p. 79 · Read in the full issue
One Shake in a Life-time
Suva residents need expect an average of only one—or maybe t™°~heavy earthquakes in a lifetime, according to geologist Robert Houtz, of the Fiji Lreological Survey, who recently prepared a survey of the situa tion.
According to Mr. Houtz—who is mindful of the fact that a man can drown in a river of average depth six inches—the statistics show that shocks of force six or higher, which are of the seriously damaging type, should occur only every 79 years, with a possible error of 27 years each way, in areas of dense population.
The actual number 'of force six earthquakes in the Colony as a whole will average much higher. For example II such shocks have occurred since 1932.