Rescue efforts in Southern Turkey and Northern Syria are in full swing, as rescue teams and volunteers continue to search desperately for survivors in the ruins of Monday's devastating 7.8 magnitude earthquake. As the horrific scenes of thousands of buildings destroyed spread across the region, experts are not surprised. Civil Engineer Jonathan Stewart of UCLA states, "We've seen this before. There was tremendous loss of life due to pancaked buildings." Indeed, the deadly aftershocks of the 1999 North Turkey magnitude quake lingers in the form of 3,000 destroyed structures and a death toll of over 5,000.

Stewart attributes the mass damage to the region's location. It lies in an area where three tectonic plates meet, making it one of the most earthquake prone in the world. In addition to the 1999 tragedy, a major quake also rocked