Risk: "Under the world's greatest cities, deadly plates"

I get a kick out of Joel Achenbach. He comments on a wide variety of things. Here he is on blogging:

World War Five

...When in doubt, go with the most hysterical headline.

(Rule one of blogging is that the End Of The World will be good for page views.)

And on the oceans:

Next Stop:The Dead Zone

Dead zones are all the rage! Here's my latest dead zone story.

That's all I do now: I've got the dead zone beat.

Refrain from obvious "deadbeat" jokes!!!...MORE

Here's his latest, from the Washington Post:

Megacities are something new on the planet. Earthquakes are something very old. The two are a lethal combination, as seen in the recent tragedy in Port-au-Prince, where more than 200,000 people perished -- a catastrophe that scientists say is certain to be repeated somewhere, and probably soon, with death tolls that once again stagger the mind.

In 1800, there was just one city with more than a million people -- Beijing. Now there are 381 urban areas with at least 1 million inhabitants. Urbanization crossed a threshold last year when, for the first time, more people lived in city settings than rural ones. About 403 million people live in cities that face significant seismic hazard, according to a recent study by seismologist Roger Bilham of the University of Colorado.

The next Big One could strike Tokyo, Istanbul, Tehran, Mexico City, New Delhi, Kathmandu or the two metropolises near California's San Andreas Fault, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Or it could devastate Dhaka, Jakarta, Karachi, Manila, Cairo, Osaka, Lima or Bogota. The list goes on and on.

"You can name about 25 cities that are like Port-au-Prince. They're not going to shake but every 250 years [on average]. But if you can name 25 of them, you're going to have an event like this every 10 years," said David Wald, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey....MORE