quote:Originally posted by Inspector Barnaby: [QUOTE]Originally posted by Tigerlily: [QB] Alison, have you been trying to get closer to the area??
The news still say 18 to 31 victims so far (reports vary), there was no update since last night. But there must be way more people still underneath the rubble.[QUOTE]
No I think folk should stay away and let the rescue people get on with it without any hassle. I heard a guy from Kefaya on the news talking and he said that some of the villagers actually killed a few people who were alive under the rubble. He said they pushed past the police and started to move stones and rubble off the area where they thought their family was, only to throw them on the adjacent pile of rubble causing it to collapse and kill the few people who were shouting and alive in that part!!
He said that there was a housing development not far away called the Suzanne Mubarak Housing Dev, and months ago the people were told to leave and go to new homes there, because of the dangers of landslide. Only a few famlies moved, and he said even some of them returned after a few weeks.
So far the confirmed dead is 31 and the PM Nawaz was visiting some of the injured, mainly kids in hospital. They showed that on the news.
If they do it right they should be able to save quite a few who have survived the initial landslide as long as they take their time and do it expertly. Folk can survive quite a long time in rubble with no food and water as we have seen already.
The bulldozers are there and clearing the way for the cranes. The people need to move and let them get on with it and if that means 'frogmarching' them out then so be it.
God help the folk underneath all that
Any information of whether this "Suzanne Mubarak Housing Dev" had water, sewer, electricity connections? Elevator's installed?
Was the building 'move in' ready? Many "public housing projects" don't do the finishing touches making it impossible for impoverished to move into their homes, instead middle class citizens end up in these homes because they can afford to furnish plumbing, electricty, phones, sewer.....
Posts: 313 | From: Between yuppies and chronics | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
Workers clear path to access Cairo rock fall site
CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptian workers cut through a railway embankment on Sunday to bring heavy earth-moving equipment to the site of a rock fall which killed at least 34 people in a Cairo shantytown.
At the scene of Saturday's disaster, rescue workers attacked the roof of one collapsed building with sledgehammers in an attempt to reach the floor below.
Residents of one street moved furniture outside and packed up other belongings on instructions from the authorities, who they said plan to demolish the building and others nearby.
But no heavy equipment such as bulldozers, loaders or cranes had reached the site in eastern Cairo by Sunday afternoon, about 30 hours after giant rocks peeled off the nearby cliff and tumbled down on to the houses and people below.
Police sources gave conflicting accounts of the number of bodies recovered from under the rocks. Some said 39, seven more than the death toll cited on Saturday. Others said 35 while the state news agency MENA said 34, quoting the health ministry.
Some of the rocks weigh more than 200 tonnes and it could take days to break them up and lift them out of the way.
The government set up a tented camp in a public garden several miles (km) away for survivors from about 100 families whose houses were destroyed or damaged.
Other residents said they had spent the night in the street and that the government had not provided food or shelter.
REFUSED TO MOVE
The cliff, part of the Muqattam Hills which flank the old city of Cairo on the eastern side, fell on one of the poor working-class areas which have sprung up around Cairo as the city grew in the last few decades.
Rockfalls have been frequent in the area and the authorities had moved some people to new houses elsewhere.
Egyptian media said some people refused to move on the grounds that the alternative houses were too far away. But some residents said they did not believe the new houses existed or thought that one needed to pay a bribe to obtain one.
"We only saw these homes on television. Where are they?" said Nimah Abdel Tawab, an elderly woman.
"The people with money took these homes. Everything in our country is for money," added Mohamed Hassan.
The disaster was the latest in a series of events which have damaged the reputation of an Egyptian government that has been in office with few changes since 2004.
The fire brigade reacted slowly last month when a blaze broke out in the offices of the upper house of parliament. It burned for more than 12 hours and gutted the historic building.
A prominent member of the ruling party and one of Egypt's wealthiest businessman, Hesham Talaat Mustafa, was then charged last month as an accessory to the killing of Lebanese singer Suzanne Tamim in Dubai in July.
In July, a Cairo court acquitted a parliamentarian from the ruling party of manslaughter over the death of more than 1,000 ferry passengers who drowned in the Red Sea in 2006. The verdict has been widely criticized.
posted
Thank you Tigerlily yes Shanta thats the place you walked through or drove up to get to the Monastery as I said the streets are steep twisting and narrow I feared the car would get stuck so I imagine the rescue operation is going to be very hazardous they will not be able to get their heavy equipment through those alleys No it wasnt an earthquake There so many houses packed together who have no sewage system and the cliffs of Mokattam are made of sandstone and the sewage has seeped through the sandstone this is why parts of it collapsed
anybody who wants to know more about the amazing Monastery on top of Mokattam Google this: The Monastery of St. Simon (Simeon) the Tanner by Lara Iskander
Posts: 11 | Registered: Aug 2008
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posted
Yes, that's right - getting rescue equipment up there will be so difficult.
I still haven't been able to find anything about donations - if it is the coptic place, I guess a lot of the copts worship in St Simon or the associated churches.
I guess this is one difference between Egypt and the UK - in the UK there would have been a donation hotline set up within hours.
I feel so sorry for the people - not only the horrific loss of life but also for the living - the loss of their homes - poor as they are - and the few belongings they did have.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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Naifin i saw lots of these type of houses and streets through out cairo. All the houses looked unfinished and unsafe. They wouldnt have stood a chance against a rock slide.
Have they recovered everyone from the rubble yet. They initally said they thought there was 500+ people under it. Do they still stand by that figure
Posts: 1710 | From: we come in peace | Registered: Mar 2008
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posted
TL - you are a mine of information! I am emailing them now about how donations can be made.. will report back.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
Sono wrote: "Majority of the victims are coptic."
No actually I don't think so.
The following are excerpts from various news articles:
"It was horror. The power went out, we heard a loud bang like an earthquake, and I thought this house had collapsed. I went out, I saw the whole mountain had collapsed," said Hassan Ibrahim Hassan , 80, whose house escaped the destruction.
Mohamed al-Sayyed , 80, too blamed the authorities. "They had said they would evacuate the entire neighbourhood in order to set up an industrial zone. We were happy about this... but they did no such thing."
Driver Abdel Latif Hossam said "there had already been some landslides, slightly hurting some people."
One resident, who gave her name only as Umm Mohamed , showed a Reuters correspondent damage to her house from the recent rockslide. The walls were severely cracked and leaking, and clouds of dust rose from the walls when struck. "If you had children, would you want them to live here? No one paid any attention to us," said Umm Mohamed.
Woman cries in Manshiyet Nasser shanty town in eastern Cairo
Anyway it does not matter Muslim or Coptic Christian - this disaster what happened is a national tragedy and only the top of the iceberg. So many more housing areas and buildings are neglected and unsafe.
Posts: 30135 | From: The owner of this website killed ES....... | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
An article posted by nasrcity yesterday states:
"...A similar incident occurred almost 15 years ago, when a 3,000-tonne chunk of rock broke off the Moqattam plateau, an escarpment on the eastern edge of the Nile valley, and crushed houses in Manshiyet Nasser, burying at least 50 people..."
The government set up a tented camp in a public garden several miles (km) away for survivors from about 100 families whose houses were destroyed or damaged.
Minister of social solidarity Ali Moselhi said 5,000 Egyptian pounds (927 dollars) would be paid to the family of each person killed and one 1,000 pounds (185 dollars) to each injured person, the official MENA news agency reported.
Posts: 11 | Registered: Aug 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Naifin: Minister of social solidarity Ali Moselhi said 5,000 Egyptian pounds (927 dollars) would be paid to the family of each person killed and one 1,000 pounds (185 dollars) to each injured person, the official MENA news agency reported.
That must be the *standard fare* for compensation by the Egyptian Government.
The following excerpt is from an article of a road accident in Sinai just three weeks ago.
" South Sinai Governor Mohamed Hani Metwalli said the government will pay LE 5,000 in compensation to the family of each married victim and LE 1,000 for unmarried ones ."
posted
Geological Study: Muqattam Erodes 100 Meters by 2050
By Aboul Seoud Mohamed 8/9/2008
Assistant Professor of geology at the Faculty of Science at Helwan University Yehia el-Kazzaz revealed a study he had conducted about the catastrophe of Muqattam and its potential collapse in the next years.
He said that Muqattam is a plateau that is located in eastern Cairo. Its area is six square km and height 160 meters. It is formed of lawyers of limestone and thin lawyers of gypsum. Cracks divided it into three plateaus: lower, middle and higher. Vertical and horizontal cracks caused rock blocks to be formed, which could fall at any time.
He said that the study revealed that Muqattam and its higher plateau, on which Muqattam city was set up, is characterized by caves, vertical joints and rockslides which formed slopes. The cliff of the higher plateau erodes at a rate of 1.7 m from the southern and the southwestern sides on an annual basis.
Such a rate was calculated through scientific studies that were conducted on aerial photographs that were taken in 1956 and satellite photographs in 1989. The erosion rate in the southwestern side was 55 meters in 33 years.
Suppose the erosion rate will remain 1.7 m a year, the sides will erode by 100 meters in 2050. This means the collapse of several luxurious villas set up on the southern and southwestern sides.
There are two examples that prove this viewpoint: the abandoned International Muqattam Hotel on the southern side and Virginia Restaurant on the southwestern side.
According to the erosion rates, the hotel and the restaurant or parts of them may collapse shortly.
Rocks fell on the road leading to the high plateau, so this road should be closed.
posted
Todays Egyptian Gazette showed a a horrible picture on the front of a dea boy they have found... there are still people missing
One man has recovered his dead father and five brothers and sisters. It is awful.
The entire front page discussed all of what this thread has spoke about but not one mention of the cause.
Posts: 11097 | From: Cairo | Registered: May 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Tigerlily: An article posted by nasrcity yesterday states:
"...A similar incident occurred almost 15 years ago, when a 3,000-tonne chunk of rock broke off the Moqattam plateau, an escarpment on the eastern edge of the Nile valley, and crushed houses in Manshiyet Nasser, burying at least 50 people..."
In addition:
"...This is not the first time the Moqattam Hills are rocked by disaster and death. In 1964, a huge rock fell from the hill on a main road in the aftermath of a killer earthquake that hit Egypt at the time.In 1984, another slide in the area happened. But most catastrophic, however, was the rockslide that happened in 1993. This rockslide caused the death of about 70 people in the Zabaleen (Rubbish Collectors) village, an adjacent village to el-Deweiqa. Less than a month later, another rock fell from the hill. It killed two children who were playing on the street."
53 confirmed dead. They cannot get the heavy plant cranes up unless they demolish a whole pile of the houses left standing to gain access. They are trying to get the people out of those houses and to a tented shelter so they can demolish the houses and get the crane up to lift the rocks.
The occupants in the houses are refusing to move from their homes. The authorities cannot got access till they go.
posted
we drove along the main road near the area last night, its literally 5mins from where i live. there are lots of police on the main road into the area and lots of people there too. You can see bright lights where they must be trying to work. Hubby said this morning that some people where still alive and calling out on their mobiles dunno if this is correct. My sister in law came home from work today saying that her friend at work, his wife, his son- 1yr old, his brother, his sister in law and his mother are all missing and they lived in that area. so so sad
and my mum emailed me saying there isn't much news in uk about the rock fall... mainly about floods and house prices!
Posts: 1248 | From: my sex is on fire!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! | Registered: Aug 2008
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This guy is a professor of geography at Durham University and blogs about landslides.
He said that some of those blocks will weigh 2300 tonnes or a lot more and the only way of clearing them will be blasting not good news for anyone who may be still alive under there - I guess the authorities will wait til they're sure noone can be alive before resorting to that means of clearing the way.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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quote:Originally posted by fish killer: and my mum emailed me saying there isn't much news in uk about the rock fall... mainly about floods and house prices!
Well FK that shouldn't really surprise you - bear in mind that to most people in the UK, Egypt is a far off land of exotic people and old monuments, and really people's minds will be returning to the things that affect their daily lives.
There has been research (and no I can't find and haven't got the time to track down a reference right now!) that people can't mentally understand large tragedies and that is why charitable / relief operations nowadays try to bring and individual human story into it so people can grasp it and empathise. (For example the 'sponsor a child' type charities - really your money goes to help the whole community where the child is not just that child but it helps you to have a 'personal' interest in it).
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
this is so sad my heart and prays go to these ppl god bless them all
Posts: 154 | From: somewhere in the uk | Registered: Mar 2008
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The International Red Cross Red Crescent have released the above bulletin on the tragedy. This link takes you to the PDF file.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
DONATIONS - money, personal help and stuff:
(suggest you check they still need volunteers before turning up if you want to offer personal help)
I have been sent an email with the details of how you can help. (Thanks - you know who you are - hope its ok to reproduce here as well).
I have extracted it here:
"Dear friends,
I am touched by everyone's concern and offers to help survivors and families affected by the Manshiet Nasser rockslide.
The injured are in one of three hospitals: Sayed Galal, El Zaraa or El Hussein. There are about 21 people distributed over the three hospitals.
Other survivors have been offered tents in a nearby youth center. The capacity is for about 300 people, but as of early this afternoon only 72 people were actually sheltered there. For now we are preparing for 200 meals a day.
People from nearby buildings have been relocated to El Fustat.
The majority of survivors and their families remain on the street near the rockslide area in hope that they will hear any news of their loved ones. It is very difficult to estimate how many they are. The target is to distribute 1000 meals daily and 1000 bottles of water there daily to affected residents and relief workers.
How you can help:
1. El Bedaya is accepting in-kind donations at its premises in Ezbit Bekhit behind the Sheikh Kassem Mosque which is on the main road along the railway. We are at the Community Center (Markaz El Khadamat), 1 Kama'en St, last floor. You can call any of these numbers for assistance in delivery or pickup of donations
bottled water (0.5 liter and 1.5 liter), 200ml and 500ml containers/boxes of milk, 200ml containers of juice clothing for children and adults (galabeyas for men and women) floor mats (plastic or straw) 200 pcs needed dry or canned food
El Bedaya has also started a relief fund for immediate needs, but also to refurbish new homes for those families who have lost absolutely everything they own. The account number is: Bank Misr, Mouski Branch, El Bedaya Association for Education, account no: 103/1/28910.
2. ADEW (the Association for Development and Enhancement of Women) headed by Dr. Iman Bibars are accepting inkind and cash donations at their offices at 8/10 El Mathaf St., 5th floor, apt 12, El Manial
You can call Magda, Sanaa or Nermine on 016 551 8588 or Magda on 010 154 0486
The needs list for inkind contributions is the same as El Bedaya's (above)
3. Sama for Development (23 Sakr Koreish St., Masakin Sheraton across from Oriental Weavers; call Khaled 010 111 3461) are delivering prepared meals including beverages. You can deliver unprepared or prepared food. They also need manpower to help package and deliver food(i.e. use your own car or pay for a pickup) to the site. Also check out their group on facebook : Ramadan Mo خtalef
4. Resala Nour Ala Nour in Shabramant are also accepting food donations. You can call 012 860 2602
5. The Food Bank is also delivering prepared meals but they are covered for the next 10 days. They are accepting donations in all major banks account number 888777. You can also call 16060. In the short-term they will be delivering food to relocated families who have lost their homes and belongings.
I have to say, everyone, that the ineptness of the 'system' in the rescue effort is shameful and has caused a lot of anger in the community; but the tireless efforts of local youth and NGO members who have gathered to help gives me hope for this country yet. They are really quite impressive.
Thank you all,"
Also, if you live in Heliopolis, please feel free to use Buzzy Bee preschool as a drop off location.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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Shanta Qadeema above has posted a link to my blog (http:\\daveslandslideblog.blogspot.com), where I have tried to provide an analysis of this landslide. I just wanted to post to first offer my condolences and second to offer any help that I might be able to provide. I hope that the rescue teams will be able to recover some victims alive, but this is a very difficult task.
In teh aftetmath of the disaster there is an urgent need to look again at the stability of these slopes and the safety of the people below.
Finally, can anyone provide details of the exact location of the landslide so that I can find it on Google Earth?
Thanks,
David Petley Wilson Professor Durham University United Kingdom
David
Posts: 6 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2008
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Its not perfect but will give you a place to start.
If you find The Citadel on the map - eastern side of Cairo - its over to the right of that. Also, check out St Simon Tanner on Google, and this will also give you the right sort of area.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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I'm sure that someone will be up soon to give you co ordinates for Google. I will as soon as hubby gets back if no one has by then.
Go to Google for now and type in the Citadel. The hills are on the opposite side of the main road to the Citadel as far as I can remember. The area is called Mokattam and Moqattam.
The Citadel is
Latitude: 30° 1' 43.17" N, Longitude: 31° 15' 36.01" E, Coord: 30.028661°, 31.260003°
Damn I wish I could work this stupid computer!!
Do you know if there are international relief workers there Prof?
Posts: 3416 | Registered: Oct 2007
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posted
Thanks for the location information, that is helpful. I am keen to try to pin down an exact location because we can then start to look at the lieklihood of a further landslide, and to understand this one better. I am grateful for any help that you can offer.
I am not aware of any international specialists in landslides having been called in, which is a shame. My feeling is that there are two issues here: 1. There is a need to get expert help to identify locations where victims might still be alive (although this is now a long shot to be honest). 2. There is also a need to be sure that the rescuers aren't endangered by a further fall from the cliff. Unfortunately a number of accidents like this have happened in the past.
It may well be that there are people in Egypt with this type of experience.
Dave
Posts: 6 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Professor David Petley: Thanks for the location information, that is helpful. I am keen to try to pin down an exact location because we can then start to look at the lieklihood of a further landslide, and to understand this one better. I am grateful for any help that you can offer.
I am not aware of any international specialists in landslides having been called in, which is a shame. My feeling is that there are two issues here: 1. There is a need to get expert help to identify locations where victims might still be alive (although this is now a long shot to be honest). 2. There is also a need to be sure that the rescuers aren't endangered by a further fall from the cliff. Unfortunately a number of accidents like this have happened in the past.
It may well be that there are people in Egypt with this type of experience.
See Tigerlily's post after this one - she found the page that worked with the Geology department number Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
This is the area you are looking for. Where it says Salah Salem( this is actually Al Azhar Park).
Across the road is the Moqattam cliff face. As<far as I can figure it is here that the landslide occured. Might be the jagged edge that fell off as there is a brownish streak running along it indicating possibly a fault line or sewage discolouration? Any ideas??
This is the same general area as the map I posted - at the moment haven't been able to get more specific - I guess if you have paid-for Google Earth available, its more 'real time' and might show it post-event.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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" Spread over 4 million sq. mtrs, Uptown Cairo is located on the Mokattam Hills, 200 metres above sea level. The new downtown will serve as a city within a city offering investment options in prime residential, commercial, retail and hospitality space ."
That's one construction site right now on Mokattam Hills. Do you know of any other ongoing projects??
I found another project:
Cairo Financial and Tourist Centre (CFTC)
"... The past three months have not been easy for ALKAN Holding Company (AHC) chairman Mohamed Nosseir, locked as he has been in a bitter feud not only with the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) but, equally, with archaeologists and intellectuals resentful of a LE2.5 billion project to build the Cairo Financial and Tourist Centre (CFTC), a 260,000-square metre business and tourism megacomplex overlooking the Citadel. An ambitious project for which land has been set aside at the foot of the Muqattam Hills, the complex -- initially scheduled for completion in 2002 -- includes eight office towers, entertainment and shopping facilities, a 600-room five-star hotel and -- the highlight, a CFTC donation -- a glass-domed trading floor ..."
OUTSIDE the old two storey house Um Hashim sat down to do her chores when the microphone in a nearby mosque announced the names of people whose dead bodies were retrieved from the rubble.
"In complete sorrow we announce the death of Mohamed Mursi," the Imam of the local mosque announced on the microphone.Tears welled up in Um Hashim's eyes.She looked at the façade of the house where she has been living for nine years since she came from el-Fayyoum, about 120 kilometres south of Cairo, to get married in el-Deweiqa, a poor slum east of the Egyptian capital that has been the scene of an epic tragedy that has already claimed the lives of 51 people, with expectation the toll to soar to unimaginable heights."Tomorrow, our names will be called out on the microphones like this," Um Hashim, 26, told the Egyptian Mail."We'll die one by one until we all perish," she added.Um Hashim and her neighbours, the residents of el-Deweiqa, have come to learn a hard lesson over the past three days: life in peril can end in disaster.The Moqattam Hills at whose feet the houses of Um Hashim and her neighbours were built are not stable all the time. Rockslides that kill scores of people have become a main feature of the place since the early 1960s.The residents of the area, however, have no options but to continue to live there and wake up every morning to hear the news of the death of one or another of their neighbours because of the rockslides."I hoped to move somewhere else a long time ago, but we don't have themeans to do this," she said. "Give me an alternative dwelling and I will pack up immediately," she added.To those who pass by Egypt's slums, the idea of people living by the rubbish and animals in places that are not fit for human life may not be understandable.But the truth, that is little known to many, is that life to the residents of these slums has run out of all options in mostcases.Um Hashim's husband is a construction labourer. His total earnings never exceed the few hundred pounds every month, an amount of money that hardly enables them to live at the subsistence level.They live together with their two children in this two-room apartment and share a bathroom with the other inhabitants of the house. They walk tens of metres every day, carrying aluminum and plastic jars on their heads, to get water from a house near to the main road. Clean water is something that the residents of most of the houses in this area cannot dream of."Do you think we are happy living here?" said Um Hashim's mother-in-law, who lives in the same two-room flat. "But life is always full of hard choices."
posted
Muqattam Death Toll Rises to 51, Armed Forces Warn of New Rockslides
9/9/2008
Yesterday, rescue teams and firefighters took 14 bodies out of the rubbles of the Muqattam Mountain rocks, setting the death toll at 51 plus 57 wounded.
Cairo Governor Abdel Azim Wazir said he would not declare the final number of the killed and wounded until rescue operations were over.
Security sources said between 15 and 20 people were still missing, claiming they were probably under the rubble.
Dozens of local residents from Duweika and Bakheet demonstrated yesterday in front of Manshiet Nasser Municipality to protest against officials' refusal to meet them and the slow pace at which these people were given alternative apartments. Some of them clashed with the police.
Security bodies cordoned off the area and banned the media from getting there. They also refused to let a delegation of the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) into the area to provide aid.
The operations aimed at sheltering the victims of the accident are extremely difficult as the area is overcrowded with tents, so much so that whole families were forced to sleep in the streets.
Meanwhile, President Mubarak ordered to provide alternative apartments to the victims and called on the government to start taking measures to tackle shantytowns.
"We intervened immediately without waiting for aid requests and I sent eight rescue teams and winches," said Civil Defense Chief of Staff Gamal Abdel Aziz.
He pointed out that his teams managed to take 25 bodies out of the rubble and save 23 wounded.
He added it was difficult to know exactly when the rescue operations would be over, as the streets are narrow and bumpy and the rocks are huge.
He warned about new possible rockslides in the area, which prompted the police to evacuate the houses.
Brigadier General Mohamed Ayad from the Armed Forces Transportation Department said that 15 trucks were bringing people to the relief camps in Fustat, while seven vehicles were providing 5,000 meals a day to the victims.
People's Assembly Speaker Fathi Sorour called for a joint meeting between the Housing and Local Government Committees next Thursday to discuss the disaster and its causes. He also invited the housing and local development ministers and the Cairo governor to attend the meeting.
Some opposition and independent MPs called on the government to step down, saying in urgent statements that it had failed to face the crisis.
Mustafa Bakry criticized the primitive ways of the rescue operations, while Dr. Gamal Zahran called for the establishment of a national anti-disaster organ.
The chairman of an Afro-Asian forum on water and environment, Mahmoud el-Sawi, filed a lawsuit against the President, the Cairo governor and the Muqattam Municipality chief to force them to stop licenses for further buildings in the plateau.
Thanks for your help, but I remain a little perplexed. The photographs clearly show buildings at the top of the slope, but I cannot see them in the area that you have highlighted. Furthermore, the reports talk of the need to cut through a railway embankment to get the plant in to the site. I cannot see this embankment either.
I realise that I am probably missing the obvious...but would really appreciate any help you can give.
Thanks for the contact details too - I will chase these up. Fortunately my university has a strong Middle East research group, so finding Arabic speakers is quite straightforward.
Thanks again,
Dave
Posts: 6 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2008
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posted
I think the railway runs parallel to the King Khaled highway (and may also be in tunnels so not visible on the map). There is/was a quarry along there. What you can't really tell from the google maps is that the Mottaqam plateau is substantially higher than the shanty towns we've indicated. Also, not sure how old the google satellite pictures are - those buildings might be newer than the pictures. I'll see if I can get more info on where the railway lines go for you.
Posts: 5593 | From: Egypt | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
Professor Petley - for the want of any better info I'll try an help a little as to the location. Google Earth - there is a ridge line, bay shaped, starting at - 30deg 2.012'N 31deg 16.612'E and ending at 30deg 2.181'N 31deg 16.854'E
I understand it is somewhere between these points.
Posts: 52 | From: Cairo | Registered: Jul 2006
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If you look at the image I posted in the bottom left hand corner where it says King Khalid Motorway, if you look beside that at where it says 2008, you can see the railway just sitting above the 08 and as Shanta says it seems to be running parallel to the KK Motorway. Manshiet Nasser area is the whole of the central area and the sand coloured plateau sits way above the dwellings. Imagine you are standing on Beachy Head and looking down the cliff face to the sand below. The heights are roughly the same in parts.
It's a big plateau with some houses on the top with a large drop and the shanty town below.
Sorry I cant describe it better for you.
Posts: 3416 | Registered: Oct 2007
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Thanks for your help. Can I try to suggest where I think it might be - you can tell me I am wrong. I have annotated an image that I have uploaded here to help:
Several people have suggested that the failure occurred off the cliff from the plateau that I have marked. However, this does not seem to make sense as (a) there are no building at the top (and the images all show that there are lots of houses - see the first inset image, taken from a Picassa album); (b) the distance to the railway embankment (marked on the image) is too large (800 m according to Google Earth). This also does not fit with the photos - see the second inset image.
My suggestion is that the failure occurred off the less prominent but not small scarp that I have indicated - this is closer to the railway line (250 m, which is about right from the photos) and it has houses on top.
Can anyone tell me whether I am horribly wroing or on the right track?
Thanks
Dave
Posts: 6 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2008
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UBBFriend: Email this page to someone!
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