Damage
The earthquake affected 700 villages and settlements, destroying 46,000 houses and making 100,000 people homeless. The number of casualties was reduced because most of the inhabitants were working in the fields at the time of the earthquake, 13:13 local time. Many important historical monuments were badly damaged, particularly the Archangel Church near Zemo Krikhi and the Mravaldzali church, which were completely destroyed.
Much of the damage associated with the earthquake was caused by landslides triggered by the shaking, rather than the shaking itself. The most common type were rock falls, followed by debris slides, slumps, earth slides, rock-block slides and rock avalanches. The most destructive was a large debris avalanche, which destroyed the village of Khokheti, killing 50 of the inhabitants. A large mass of Jurassic volcanic rock fell onto water-saturated alluvium, combining to form the debris avalanche. The debris avalanche, which had an estimated volume of over 30 x 106 m3, swept down a valley through Khokheti, blocking the Gebura River, forming a 100 m high dam, that breached soon afterwards, causing more destruction. Two of the earth slides showed a delayed movement, with most displacement occurring a few days after the main shock. The Chordi landslide was active before the earthquake and showed only minor movement at the time of the main shock. Two to three days later, the slide started to move at about 8 m per day, destroying the village of Chordi. On 18 May, the slide was still moving at 2 m per day. This slide moved on claystone of the Maikop Formation and had a total volume of about 20 x 106 m3.
The large aftershock on 15 June caused extensive damage in the Java to Tskhinvali area. At least 8 people were killed and 200 injured. However, due to a protest rally by the local people, dozens, but not hundreds were killed. The village of Khakhet was destroyed.
Read more about this topic: 1991 Racha Earthquake
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