The Couva Children’s Hospital was designed to standard international code, and work began after an independent geotechnical report stated the hospital could be built on the site, the Urban Development Corporation of T&T (Udecott) said in a statement yesterday. “The facility is 100 per cent designed to standard international code and in the event of a major earthquake will allow for continuity of operations, care of patients, and receipt of casualties and those in need of healthcare,” the agency said.
Udecott said the hospital, estimated to cost $1.5 billion, was designed by HKS, a “well-established and respected,” US-based, hospital-design company, “in keeping with seismic-scope requirements, including surface displacement and liquefaction.” The hospital is being constructed on 60 acres of land near the Couva-Preysal interchange and east of the Solomon Hochoy Highway which formerly belonged to Caroni (1975) Ltd.
Last week, the T&T Guardian reported that the hospital was in jeopardy because it was being built near the Central Range Fault Line along which earthquakes as large as 7.5 on the Richter scale could occur, according to seismic experts. Dr Joan Lutchman, a seismologist at the University of the West Indies (UWI) Seismic Research Centre, said construction of the hospital should be halted and a new location sought to prevent any untoward incident in future.
Because a hospital was involved, Lutchman said extra precautions should be taken to ensure that in the event of a major earthquake, the facility would not be compromised and would be operational.
Chairman of the National Building Code Committee Shyankaran Lalla, in a letter to Housing Minister Dr Roodal Moonilal and Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan, said: “Medical facilities are essentially required, as a lifeline structure, not as routine requirement, and must be fully functional post disaster...Quakes are inevitable, but we can take action now to limit the damage.” Khan and Moonilal said the matter is receiving their attention and they are awaiting relevant technical reports.
The seismic report
A preliminary report by the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Management (ODPM) and the Seismic Research Centre, UWI, stated:
• The site of the hospital is located within ten km of the Central Range/Warm Springs (CR/WS) fault system
• The fault system is an active geologic structure that poses very high seismic risk to buildings and infrastructure located in its vicinity
• A full rupture of the fault will result in an earthquake of around 7.5, based on scientific research
• The decision to build the hospital so near the CR/WS fault is not in keeping with the thrust of sustainable development
More info
• The Central Range (CR) “strike-slip” fault system is the major fault crossing Trinidad
• The fault system accommodates at least 60 per cent of the movement between the Caribbean and South American plates
• There has been no rupture of the fault for hundreds of years
• Researchers have proposed that the CR fault zone is locked and has accumulated several metres of movement during its centuries of quiescence.
• These observations indicate a serious seismic hazard
(Soto, Escalona and Mann, 2011, Journal of Marine and Petroleum Geology)