Climate Change, and Natural Disasters:

The effect it has on Short Term Insurance.

With the recent Earthquake, on Sunday Evening, 11 June 2023, measured on the Richter M/L 4,4 as recorded by the Council for Geoscience, however, the European Seismological Centre, recorded it as 5,0 M/L

The epicenter was located a few km outside an East Rand mine, in Boksburg.

This tremor shocked residents of Gauteng in the early morning of 11 June 2023.

Although not deep, it was advised by seismologists as a natural earthquake, in an article (by Nick Pawson, in Africa News), published on the Web the question is asked, can it be related to mining activity?

In a blog, by Wikipedia, South Africa had 20 earthquakes, mostly in Gauteng and Free State

According to Professor Andrzej Kijko from the University of Pretoria, mining can trigger natural faults, however, he believes 95% of South Africa’s earthquakes are caused by mining shock. (Blog on the web, Wikipedia.)

I lived in the mining Town of Welkom; you get used to tremors. Mining may cause the tectonic earth plates to move and cause a mining tremor.

Drawing a circle narrow, and wider from Johannesburg Centre, you will find that in areas as far as Welkom in the Free State, Pretoria/Cullinan included, this is an area prone to mining shock – keep in mind your short-term policy includes natural earth tremors, not mining tremors. I will strongly advise anyone staying in this circle to add cover for mining-related earth tremors.

Normally in South Africa, we had seven-year cycles of natural tremors, however, in the Paarl, Durbanville and Saldana, we recorded 3 tremors in 2020.

Likewise, we had an increase within the 7-year expectation reduced to two in a year, like the floods in KZN, Veld Fires in the Eastern Cape, Storms, and Flooding.

I would recommend the public, build their houses above the flood line, which was 50 meters from a river or dam. (Structures build after 1998, the new norm is 100 meters above the food line. (Published on the web, by Briefly News)

Natural hazards occur more frequently, La Ninja, and El Nanjo, you cannot predict the year it will come because of earth warming, and climate change.

(Many thanks to Wikipedia used as a source on the Web.)