Bangladesh earthquake alert: Mega-thrust fault may cause a 9.0 killer earthquake claiming 140 million lives

A gigantic earthquake may be lurking under South Asia. A mega-thrust fault under Bangladesh, Myanmar and India may expose millions to the risk of a 9.0 magnitude earthquake that could claim numerous lives.

A GPS study of Myanmar, India and Bangladesh has revealed evidence that the north-eastern corner of the Indian subcontinent is actively colliding with Asia. The region is home to more than 140 million people. The geologic feature of the region is pretty similar to the catastrophic 9.0 magnitude earthquake in Japan in the year 2011.

In case the new study’s models are correct, millions of people are now sitting on an active mega-thrust fault that has the potential to cause a massive disaster. Moreover, the models suggest that the fault is tuck and has been amassing stress for more than 400 years.

According to National Geographic, Bangladesh and US researchers have warned that an area covering 124 miles may be loaded with immense levels of tectonic strain. In case the fault gives way in one go, it may result in earthquakes with magnitudes of up to 9.0. The devastation caused would be catastrophic as the region is not prepared for handling such seismic disasters. However, experts are not sure when the fault will give way.

“We can see the strain building up, we can see the motion of the plates but we can't estimate when something might happen. It would certainly be one of the largest [recorded quakes]. I suspect it might be at the lower end [of the 8.2-9 scale], but I can't rule out a really large one,” Michael Steckler, a geophysicist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and lead author of the paper, told Fairfax Media.

Sediments flows from rivers Brahmaputra and the Ganges have layered parts of the country with almost 20 kilometres of mud and sand. This has masked the extension of the fault line. The same fault line had caused 2004 Sumatra tsunami and killed 230,000 people.

Authorities may reduce the deadly impact of massive earthquakes by tightening building codes. The warning extends not only to Bangladesh but also to Aizawl , the capital of India's Mizoram state to the north-east. The study has been published in Nature Geoscience.