"I can tell you within our newsroom in Santiago, which is state of the art in terms of seismic construction, it shook for more than 45 seconds, " he said.

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Many of those that collapsed were put up before 1980 when Italy brought in stricter regulations for construction in areas of seismic activity.

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Increasing oil production takes quite a few years, involving time spent on seismic studies, exploratory drilling, production drilling, as well as construction of infrastructure for transportation and refining.

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Long known to stand above a geological fault, the stadium was declared unsafe in a seismic review, said Barbour, who added that about 70% of the project's construction cost comes from safety upgrades.

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His 15-person company, Rich Duncan Construction, handles about 50 projects a year such as renovating offices, building restaurants or doing seismic upgrades on airport towers.

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