The ancient destructive capability of earthquake faults is well chronicled by historians and their cultural impact widely uncovered by archaeologists. Archaeological and geological investigations at some of the most renowned sites in the ancient Greece world, however, suggest a more nuanced and intimate relationship between seismic faults and past human settlements.

This paper investigated the meteorological role of an extraordinary rain event over Artvin. Although alert messages were prepared by the Turkish State Meteorological Service on August 23 at 09:00 UTC, 11 people died and infrastructures, buildings, private property, and public goods were damaged as a result of the flash flood. It is hoped that more detailed studies will be performed on synoptic development leading to extreme summer precipitation events in the eastern Black Sea.

The influx of millions of Syrian refugees into Turkey has rapidly changed the population distribution along the Dead Sea Rift and East Anatolian fault zones. In contrast to other countries in the Middle East where refugees are accommodated in camp environments, the majority of displaced individuals in Turkey are integrated into local cities, towns, and villages – placing stress on urban settings and increasing potential exposure to strong earthquake shaking. Yet, displaced populations are often unaccounted for in the census based population models used in earthquake casualty estimations.