01:01 p
Thursday 09 February 2023
I wrote – Heba Khamis:
In conjunction with the earthquake that occurred in Turkey and Syria, at dawn last Monday, and its repeated aftershocks, the city of Alexandria suffered from a wave of bad weather, as sea waves rose and eroded part of the Edward Kharrat beach, and cracks and an inclination appeared in the Corniche wall with a length of 20 meters, as a result of land subsidence, to begin The executive bodies examine the situation on the ground in order to find out the causes of the problem and its solution.
And spread on social media platforms, that what happened is related to the earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria, but some went further, linking predictions that expect Alexandria to sink due to climate changes and the decline that occurred.
These speculations, which topped the social media, are considered by Dr. Ayman El-Gamal, head of the Beach Research Institute in Alexandria, to be misplaced, based on the inspection he made of the Corniche in the Sidi Beshr area where the subsidence occurred, explaining that the earthquake that occurred and the time in Turkey and Syria was a land earthquake, not a sea one, even if If it happened in the sea, a tsunami would not occur because of the distance, explaining that the problem of subsidence has nothing to do with the earthquake. If there was anything to do with the earthquake, the crack would have occurred along the Corniche coast.
Al-Jamal explains what happened because of the project to protect the Alexandria beach from slaughter, where artificial tongues are being made to transport the rocks that will be placed in the barrier on cars, because the cost of transportation in this way is cheaper than transportation on boats.
Specifically, in that area, the executing company worked on the artificial tongue that blocked the sand from reaching the beach throughout the summer months, and because of the exposure of the beaches to erosion in the winter, the erosion continued without compensation for the sand, so the water reached the bottom of the sidewalk, and the sand leaked from that area, and the crack occurred.
“Any beach that is sacrificed in the summer increases the sand by compensating for the lost, and in the winter there is a sacrifice, and because of the presence of the tongue as a barrier, there is no compensation for the sand, and the situation has reached its current state.”
The “camel” supervised the repair of what happened and filled the gaps at the bottom of the sidewalk, and the place was opened again for passers-by as a temporary solution until the executing company finishes its project and removes the industrial corridor and the beach returns to its original state.
“The Camel” explained people’s panic naturally, as they link the earthquake to witnessing the 199 earthquake, which was not a sea earthquake, as its epicenter was the city of Dahshur, so the city of Cairo was damaged more than Alexandria, and in response to the rumors of tsunami waves, “The Camel” commented that the earthquake centers in the Mediterranean are in Cyprus. The island of Crete and those areas take the wave from one hour to two hours until it reaches the coast of the city of Alexandria, so it is unlikely that this will happen.
“When we talk about drowning, we must differentiate between permanent drowning and temporary drowning. Temporary drowning occurs at the time of intense nuclei, and in 2015 all the streets of Alexandria were flooded, but permanent drowning is unlikely to happen.”
Al-Jamal believes that no matter how high the sea level rises, the city is safe, and its coast is being fortified with many beach protection projects, as is happening now, to counter the rise and protect the city from drowning.