Hotels in Turkey, especially in Istanbul and other tourist areas, need an urgent seismic inspection to reassure tourists. Local experts made this statement on the pages of Turkish tourism media. From their point of view, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism should immediately make it mandatory to obtain a safe building certificate with an indication of earthquake resistance for all hotels and other buildings used for tourism purposes, especially in Istanbul and other tourist areas recognized as dangerous.
First of all, experts mentioned in this connection the theory put forward by seismologists of “the proximity of an earthquake in Istanbul” – let’s remind you, it was put forward in particular by German experts (read details here) – and Germany in 2022 became the most significant tourist market for Turkey. “If Istanbul, home to more than 16 million people and producing 55% of the Turkish economy, experiences an earthquake with the same tragic consequences, it will lead to a complete economic disaster,” experts say.
At the same time, tourism deserves special attention. “The issue of earthquake resistance of hotels came to the fore after a group of guides and young athletes were trapped under rubble at the Adıyaman Grand Isias Hotel in Adıyaman. We critically need to document that tomorrow our hotels cannot collapse in the same way as this hotel,” tourism expert Deniz Emin Tufekci said in his article. According to him, tourists need confidence in the seismic resistance of the buildings and hotels in which they will stay.
“The question of whether our hotel will also collapse in this case will be on every tourist’s mind, that’s natural. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism should immediately make it mandatory for hotels in our country, especially in Istanbul and our cities on known seismic fault lines, to obtain a safe building certificate with an indication of earthquake resistance,” the expert says. Hotels that cannot get such a certificate should stop working, he adds.
There was already a similar experience during the pandemic, adds Mr. Tufekci. The hotels were quick enough to get a certificate of safe tourism for health purposes. According to him, it is not very difficult to “create” a certificate for earthquake resistance. “By measuring the vibration period of the ground and the structure using the microtremor method, it is now possible to quickly estimate how many earthquakes a building can withstand without damaging the building, core drilling, or damaging the concrete,” the Turkish expert added. He also emphasized that there is already a similar experience. “Japan is a country where earthquakes happen all the time, but no tourist is afraid to travel because of it, and they never stop seeing Japan. They know that the houses are quite safe,” said Mr. Tufekci. Otherwise, according to his assessment, competitors will certainly take advantage of the earthquake situation to “sink” the Turkish tourism industry, which is vital to the country.