Towards this goal, the NDMA has recently undertaken an exercise to develop a scenario of what would happen if a quake of magnitude 8 on the Richter scale occurs at a certain location, he said.
Earlier, an exercise was undertaken for such a quake occurring some 200 km away from Delhi, for the National Capital Region.
Subsequently, NDMA undertook a more detailed ‘Multi-State Earthquake Scenario' project for a hypothetical magnitude 8 earthquake occurring in Mandi in Himachal Pradesh.
“If an earthquake of magnitude 8 or more occurs in a place like Mandi, at least 20,000 people may die in a city like Chandigarh, the nearest biggest urban settlement,” Reddy said.
