Kobe earthquake structural damage The cities of Kobe and Osaka are connected by an elevated highway. The earthquake caused several portions of this highway to collapse and a lot of damage to the surrounding buildings and structures. The Effects of the Earthquake: The immediate effects of the earthquake are known as primary effects. They include the collapse of buildings, bridges and roads resulting from the seismic waves shaking the crust. During the 20 second earthquake, the ground moved up to 50 centimetres horizontally and up to 1 metre vertically. Some of the deaths were caused by these primary effects. The secondary effects include the fires that broke out all over the city of Kobe, the congestion and chaos on the roads, the closure of businesses and the problem of homelessness. Many more people died in the fires that followed the earthquake. Problems were made worse by the large number of aftershocks. Many of the older, wooden houses completely collapsed. Fire, triggered by broken gas pipes and sparks from severed electrical cables, caused a huge amount of damage, destroying at least 7,500 wooden homes. Office blocks built in the 1960's of steel and concrete frequently collapsed in the middle so that a whole floor was crushed but the rooms above and below remained intact. Modern buildings, designed to be earthquake proof, did quite well on the whole and suffered little damage, although some were left standing at an angle when the ground beneath them liquefied. An additional problem for rebuilding was that most people were not covered by insurance due to the difficulties of insuring such an earthquake prone area.