Earthquakes
Earthquakes are incredibly common in Haiti. Haiti is located on a fault line, resulting in numerous earthquakes, which have been recorded as some of the most deadly and damaging in modern history. In 2021 alone, 1,647 earthquakes were recorded nationwide. On August 14, 2021, Haiti was struck by a 7.2 magnitude earthquake, killing a reported 2,248 people, injuring more than 12,760 people, and leaving more than 650,000 people in need of humanitarian assistance. The earthquake damaged healthcare facilities, added additional strain to Haiti’s limited health capacity, and impaired Haiti’s capacity to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 2021 earthquake hit as Haiti was still recovering from the devastation and destruction brought about from the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on January 12, 2010. The 2010 earthquake caused more than 200,000 estimated deaths and displaced an estimated 1.6 million people. More than 300,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, and the cost of rebuilding was estimated to be at least $14 billion.
Port-au-Prince, January 2010. Photo: Ellie Happel, 2010.
Haiti’s location on a fault line makes mining an incredibly dangerous activity. An earthquake could result in severe damage to mining sites which have a significant risk of causing catastrophic pollution of water sources and irreversible damage to land. Tailings, waste generated from mining, are often kept behind giant earth dams, called tailing dams. Environmental justice organization Earthworks has reported that these dams have been failing more frequently and with increasingly catastrophic results in recent years. Earthquakes increase the risk of tailings dam failure. Even very low magnitude earthquakes have preceded tailings dam failures. In 2015, a tailings dam failed in Brazil after a few small earthquakes, each no greater than 2.6 magnitude. 19 people were killed. The failed dam released 60 million cubic meters of waste devastating the environment of nearby towns and contaminating the river, the primary source of food and water of nearby communities. In 2019, less than 4 years later, another tailings dam collapsed in Brazil, killing at least 270 people and releasing almost 10 million cubic meters of waste into the Paraopeba River environment. The failure polluted the river and hundreds of thousands of people lost their source of clean water. The increasing rate of failures has been linked to modern mining practices which generate enormous amounts of waste.
Tailings Dam Disaster in Brazil: The tailings dam collapsed, killing 270 people and releasing metals and toxins into the local rivers. Brazil, 2019. Ibama from Brasil, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
The high number of earthquakes in Haiti poses an additional risk of tailings dams failing. Any damage or pollution to Haiti’s water sources or land would be crippling to a country where less than 67% of the population has access to clean water, where rural communities rely significantly on privately purchased water or surface or groundwater, and where most people on land currently under mining permits live in subsistence farming communities.
Talings dam in Japan. Copyright National Land Image Information (Color Aerial Photographs), Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, Attribution, via Wikimedia Commons.
Mining is the most significant cause of human-induced earthquakes worldwide. In Haiti, the known and presumed gold reserves are located along the fault line, significantly increasing the risk of earthquakes caused by mining in an already earthquake-prone region. In recent years, the Southwest peninsula, the central part of the country and the northern region—home to most of Haiti’s metal minerals—have all been rocked by earthquakes. Although most mining-induced earthquakes are of low magnitude, even low-magnitude earthquakes, as evidenced in Brazil in 2015, can cause fatal tailings dam failures with catastrophic consequences for the environment.
We can live without gold, We cannot live without water.
- KJM Press Statement