Much of the Colombian city was devastated by the earthquake, measuring six on the Richter Scale from less than 32km (20 miles) beneath the surface.

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Hundreds, if not thousands of homes, were destroyed but a few passed the test they had been designed for - and are still standing.

Zygmunt Lubkowski, from the international structural engineering company Ove Arup and Partners, says there are a number of factors in Colombia which could have added to the destruction brought by the country's largest earthquake this century.

He said: "If we design to modern codes of practice and ensure buildings are constructed properly we can prevent the loss of life that has been seen in Colombia.

"In Third World countries, people build their own houses. It's no wonder these buildings fall down.

"This is why there is so much damage. It's either old structures, structures designed to outdated codes or no code at all and badly built structures."

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Protecting a building against earthquakes does not come cheap. It can add 5% to the cost of construction.

But there are relatively simple design techniques for strengthening the resistance of normal homes such as 'tying' walls and roofs together with metal pins.

During an earthquake walls shake while the roof remains static until the movement of the walls causes the roof to fall.

When 'tied' the roof moves with the walls to minimise the damage.

Mr Lubkowski, a geo-seismic engineer, said: "For most people the bottom line is a building they will get out of alive. If you can prevent the roof caving in you have a better chance of that."

Other buildings - power stations or multi-storey office blocks - need much more sophisticated methods to stand up to an earthquake.

They include:

• Fusing the structural system

  The force of an earthquake is channelled to a specific part of the building so although that part of the building will need repair, it will protect the rest of the building from damage.

• Friction pendulum bearings

  The construction is built on a number of bearings which, are composed of a bearing and a concave dish. When the earthquake strikes, the protection system pushes upwards reducing the force striking the building.

"But if you get a large enough earthquake during the lifetime of that building it will cost a lot more to repair or re-build it."

Earthquakes can also cause differing damage depending on a series of factors from the depth of origin - the Colombian one was close to the surface in geological terms - to intensity.

In Mexico 1985 all the quake's energy was released in such a way that only buildings above 10 to 15 storeys were damaged.

Japan and California, both rich areas sitting in earthquake zones, are leading the way in using state-of-the-art quake-proofing techniques.