The five boroughs are home to more than 200,000 multifamily buildings made with un-reinforced brick and built from the mid-1800s to the 1930s, according to a city hazard plan. Many rowhouses across the city neighborhoods fall into this category.
Such masonry cannot bend or flex during an earthquake and would instead break or crumble. A strong earthquake could cause some buildings of this type to collapse.
— The New York Times
Last week’s 4.8 magnitude tri-state quake wasn’t nearly as strong as the (estimated) 5.5 magnitude incident that occurred on August 10, 1884, and would have caused $4.7 billion worth of damage to the modern city, according to the New York Times.
Experts have warned that the risk posed to New York City, even after its amended 1995 building codes called for “seismic gaps” between buildings, remains at least faintly plausible.
A 2002 Times article on earthquake preparedness in the Big Apple states the probability of a magnitude 6.0 or higher event occurring even once in the next 19,500 years is still "unlikely."
The USGS-documented sinking of buildings in Manhattan, meanwhile, is happening at a rate of between 1 to 2 millimeters per year.
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