Romanian Polytechnic University from Bucharest is testing along Israeli company a detection system able to issue earthquake alerts at least 4 hours in advance.
According to the Israeli company Ionoterra, Bucharest Polytechnic University was chosen for its tight connections with the Israeli researchers, but also for the fact that Romania is one of the most seismic active areas in Europe.
The most advanced earth detection system at present detects earthquakes 3 minutes in advance and it is used in the USA and Japan.
In Romania there is implemented another kind of earth detection system. It doesn’t detect in advance the earthquake, but it alerts the people living in front of the seismic wave after it strikes. This is based on the distance between the place where the earthquake strikes (usually in the middle of the country) and the massive populated cities (such as Bucharest). The seismic wave takes 30 seconds to reach Bucharest and this is why Romanian institutions started implementing the alert system which notifies the app users about the event, including the degree of the earthquake on the Richter scale.
Ionoterra offered the Romanian Government the possibility to be the first country to test it officially, on a large scale. According to the inventors of the method, the device will be able to detect an earthquake even 8 hours in advance, which will definitely save thousands of lives.
The last biggest earthquake in Romania happened in 1977, with a 7,2 magnitude on Richer scale, and it left more than 1500 dead and 11000 injured, most of them in the capital city, Bucharest.
![](https://valahia.news/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/enjoy-romania-experirence.jpg")
