Kashmir Valley Megaearthquakes
By Susan Hough, Roger Bilham, Ismail Bhat
Estimates of the magnitudes of past seismic events foretell a very shaky future for this pastoral valley
This Article From Issue
January-February 2009
Volume 97, Number 1
Page 42
DOI: 10.1511/2009.76.42
Flanked on all sides by mountain ranges, the Kashmir Valley has been for millennia both blessed and cursed by its geography and geology. The Himalaya and Pir Pinjal ranges have provided native Kashmiri people an inexhaustible source of water to irrigate naturally fertile soils. At the same time, would-be invaders have faced geography that has formed nearly impregnable lines of defense. But the massive forces that push these mountains upward pose a real and present danger to the pastoral setting of the valley.
Paula Bronstein/Getty Images
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