On July 11, 1927, the biggest earthquake hit Israel. Centered around Jericho, the natural disaster killed 300 people and injured thousands while causing millions in damage to physical structures.

This event would have not been remembered in the detail that it is had it not been for one determined educator from Haifa.

Professor Moshe Inbar from the Department of Geography at the University of Haifa found a photo album five years ago that documented the damage after the earthquake. For Professor Inbar, an expert in natural disasters, this is a real treasure: the photos document the great earthquake that struck the Land of Israel and across through Trans-Jordan wreaking havoc across the region.

This was the first earthquake in the Land of Israel that had been recorded using modern seismographs; its magnitude was clocked as 6.2 on the Richter scale. The primary jolt came from north of the Dead Sea, just outside the ancient city of Jericho and it was so massive, that the vibrations were felt all over the country and even across the Dead Sea in Jordan.

The destruction was great, but even then, structures that were built properly survived with the less-well-made structures, ones made of wood or improperly layered bricks collapsed. Professor Inbar estimates that the photographer of the photos, whose identity is unknown, was an engineer because next to the photos he made comments about the quality of the construction. In addition, he then pointed to buildings that survived due to higher-quality construction. In one case he noted "bad filling," and as for Jericho he wrote: "New hotel, walls of blocks, iron beams."

According to Professor Inbar, "The pictures teach us about the magnitude of the quake, where it spread, the places where the quake was horizontal and others where it was from the bottom up. These are important research findings. In addition, there is documentation that the quake impacted areas far north of the center, in the Galilee near Nazareth and in Kibbutz Degania where a building was seen with a massive crack after the earthquake.

In a 2005 study, researchers located an elderly man who was about 10 years old at the time of the quake. He said he was walking from the school in Nazareth to his village when the quake began and described how he saw his house destroyed.

"It is interesting that although the kibbutzim have documented many events in their history, there is no record of the quake in the Jordan Valley kibbutzim.

"For me as a researcher, it is very exciting to see this documentation, to really touch on quality images that are another layer in the mosaic that we are trying to build in the field of earthquakes and natural disasters in Israel.”