Asia Officials Failed to Issue Warnings

[Tab]

JAKARTA, Indonesia - Asian officials conceded Monday that they failed to issue broad public warnings immediately after a massive undersea earthquake in Indonesia, which could have saved countless lives from the subsequent giant waves that smashed into nine countries.

But governments insisted they did not know the true nature of the threat because there was no international system in place to track tidal waves in the Indian Ocean — an area where they are rare — and they can't afford to buy sophisticated equipment to build one.

And what warnings there were came too little, too late.

The magnitude 9.0 earthquake — the largest in 40 years — shifted huge geological plates beneath the sea northwest of Sumatra island, causing a massive and sudden displacement of millions on tons of water.
More: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/ap/20041227/ap_on_re_as/quake_warning_system

[Ian David]

1. Plenty of money to build nukes, though

[RC]

2. Yep. I wonder how much system 187 billion could build?

Plenty of money to kill people, very little to help them in time of need.

[Deja Q]

15. From the US corporate giving them American jobs, no less.

Funny, that. The US wants globalization yet it wants isolationism. If you ask me, something about that makes as much sense as a castrated turnip.

[JPace]

3. Bush only cares about stopping abortion....

if pregnant women are drowned its o.k., as long as she didn't end the pregnancy deliberately. Bush has no money or time for natural deaths, especially from a country that has no oil.

[Squatch]

6. What does Bush have to do with this story?

[JPace]

11. A bit of foreign aid could have built a warning system for these

very very poor people. We give 1/10th of one percent of our budget to foreign aid....cheap cheap cheap. Plenty of money for big business tax breaks, and tax cuts for the wealthy. Plenty of money for killing machines to instigate and win wars.

"What does Bush have to do with this story?"
Its a connection that one makes on DU....why get paranoid about it?
:spank:

[kostya]

13. Sorry, maybe you didn't get your DU decoder ring yet?

Everything is Bush's fault. Didn't you know that? - K (who thinks about 60% is Bush's fault)

[lebkuchen]

4. There were hours separating the quake from the tsunamis

and nobody on the coast of the Indian Ocean had a clue. Why not?

[Squatch]

7. The alert network is not established in the Indian Ocean

where tsunamis are extremely rare. I'm thinking they're going to reconsider after this event.

[kostya]

16. How much of an alert network do you need? Won't telephones and radios

work? We get tsunami warnings here in the PNW now and then and they never materialize (yet). If you had a 9.0 quake, why wouldn't you just put out a general alert by all means that a tsunami might be in progress. They had plenty of time for that it seems. I don't see the need for a special warning system, especially if it is a rare occurence! Actually, where is it a regular occurence? - K

[lebkuchen]

18. Agreed

Since it was the 4th largest quake in recorded history, if my news is correct, tourists in countries bordering the Indian Ocean were likely relying on their host government to get out a warning to the general public, which is why so many were out snorkeling, boating, or sunbathing--they had placed faith in that particular government to warn the general population. I don't buy the excuse that no warning system was in place. The TV news should have been warning to these govts' enough to at least be on the watch for water surges or explosive noises coming from the ocean, if not a mandate that everyone move to higher ground.

There will be a warning system in place after the infrastructure is repaired if these countries want tourists to return. Western countries should play a vital role in ensuring such a system exists.

It's pathetic that we spend so much on war and nothing on earthquakes/volcanic eruptions/tsunamis in areas where they are likely to occur. Tambora was the largest recorded volcanic ever, in Indonesia and it had resulted in tsunamis. Now we have a catastrophic earthquake in the same area, and no warning system? That's BS.

[Squatch]

20. Who do you mean by "we"

Humankind in general?

"It's pathetic that we spend so much on war and ... Now we have a catastrophic earthquake in the same area, and no warning system?"

[lebkuchen]

24. Oh please

The US spends more on military weapons than all other countries put together.

How many billions has the US spent on Iraq already, to level it? And the best it can do for Asia is $35 million. That is bullshit.

[jbnow]

9. I'm sure they will get the equipment now

but tsunamis are rarely a danger in the Indian Ocean. This isn't the best description, but one I found quickly.

http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/seg/cdroms/geohazards_v3/document/648001.htm
"Only a few tsunamis have been generated in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. In the Atlantic Ocean, there are no subduction zones at the edges of plate boundaries to spawn such waves except small subduction zones under the Caribbean and Scotia arcs. In the Indian Ocean, however, the Indo-Australian plate is being subducted beneath the Eurasian plate at its east margin. Therefore, most tsunamis generated in this area are propagated toward the southwest shores of Java and Sumatra, rather than into the Indian Ocean."

Even if they knew about the earthquake, the response isn't to go to higher ground in most of these areas. This was an anomaly in modern times...and many places don’t prepare for anomalies.

I'm sure this will change all that!

[Squatch]

10. Funny thing about the possibility of tsunamis in the Atlantic...

Here's something that should scare the hell out of you.

The Island of La Palma is deemed to be one of the most salient threats to trigger a tsunami:




http://www.benfieldhrc.org/CentreNews/press%20releases/tsunami.htm

[FlaGranny]

21. I remember seeing a report

on Discovery Channel or TLC about this island. A huge slip crack is developing on the Western side of the island and the scientists don't know whether it could go tomorrow or in a hundred years. Very scary for the east coast of the US, Canada, and SA.

[kostya]

22. Hawaii has had such slides before and there is one area now

that has the potential for slipping and causing 300' tidal waves on the West Coast of the U.S. - K

[MissB]

23. Because it's been nearly 500 years since

they've seen anything like this. Because apparently most of the tsunamis that cause destruction originate in the Pacific Ocean, not the Indian Ocean. I heard a figure of 95% yesterday. :shrug:

[jmcgowanjm]

5. the masses are not on this planet to be warned

they are here to contribute to their rulers.
The best the masses can hope for is benign
neglect.

the people expand into every liveable niche,
like Bangladesh-to pass US in pop in a decade,
maybe.

Indonesia, becoming an energy importer this
year, will be hard pressed to bring aid.

But Aceh, the area hit, is a big gas/oil (Exxon/Mobil)
producer, and a rebel seccessionist area,
so Jakarta has to do something.

The vise squeezes. Where will the pressure be released.

We haven't heard from the hardest hit areas
yet.

[jmcgowanjm]

8. Good summary from BBC here

We really haven't heard from Bangladesh
or Madras, India

Madras name has been changed to Chennai.

The south-eastern coast, Myanmar, is reported to have been struck by a huge wave. -That would be Rangoon

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/4126019.stm

Out on a limb-At least a quarter million must have perished.

Sumatra, the landmass closest to the epicentre of
the earthquake, seems to be as devastated as the areas
from Sri Lanka and India from where images are available. It
is therefore of vital importance that needs assessments
can start soon.

"We expect to find the damage inflicted by two
consecutive disasters. The earthquake and aftershocks
have caused buildings to collapse, and the subsequent
tidal waves will have created further havoc," said
Weuts.

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/fromthefield/110416158158.htm

[Catchawave]

12. Camping on the California coast, we were warned and

evacuated for a tidal threat due to an earthquake under the Pacific several hundred miles away. It never materialized, but I hear this is a common practice on the West Coast ?

[stopbush]

14. Racist story - Asian officials, bad!

I had started a thread on this story and it was suggested I post it here, so here goes:

The whole story is here: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=516&e=1...

When you read the story, you find out that the reason the "Asian" officials didn't issue any warnings was because, "governments around the region insisted they did not know the true nature of the threat because there was no international system in place to track tidal waves in the Indian Ocean — where they are rare — and they cannot afford to buy sophisticated equipment to build one."

Do you see the difference? If you're Asian and you don't have a warning system because you can't afford one, then you've "failed" when you don't issue a warning. Compare that to the * administration when alarm bells were sounding for years and months about OBL, where anti-aircraft defenses were set up in Genoa for the G8 in summer of 2001, where Ashcroft stopped flying commericallly, where a PDB was issued in August 2001 stating "OBL Determined to Strike in US," where an airplane ran into the WTC and employees were sent back to their offices before the second plane struck - and when the attacks happen, the media accepts that warnings couldn't be issued to New Yorkers because "none of us could have imagined that terrorists would use planes as missles."

Oh, BTW - such an early warning system for Tsunamis DOES exist in the Pacific - it's run by the USA. ("An international warning system in the Pacific was started in 1965, the year after tsunamis associated with a magnitude 9.2 quake struck Alaska. It is administered by the U.S-based National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Member states include all the major Pacific rim nations in North America, Asia and South America, as well as the Pacific islands, Australia and New Zealand." ).

[jmcgowanjm]

17. And Racist reaction

The death toll from the epic tsunami that rocked 11
countries rose to 40,000 people Tuesday, and food and
supplies poured into the region, part of what the U.N. said
would be the biggest relief effort the world has ever
seen. Millions remained
homeless.

US sends $15 million in aid. I wonder if this included
the $100,000 each to the "six" countries affected.

Compare that to $13 billion in aid to Florida.

Want to lose Foreign Policy creds?
Watch what China does here.

[allemand]

19. Sorry, but this time regional officials clearly are to blame

"We knew something would be hitting us" (Dr R S Dattatrayam, director (seismology) at India Meteorological Department).
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/971639.cms

That alone should have been motivation enough to issue a warning (like having the president or prime minister of the respective countries go on air and addressing the nation immediately).

On the other hand, I doubt that an expensive warning system for an event that happens on average every 100 years is that important. Efforts to raise public awareness (education), to facilitate internal communication in case of crisis (allowing Dr Dattatrayam to directly call the president/prime minister if need be) and to be able to inform the public quickly (direct access to mayor TV and radio stations) seem to make a lot more sense. They will be useful in all types of crises.

When you have a 9.0 seafloor earthquake, you know that there will be a tsunami and it doesn't really matter if the wave will be 3 or 33 feet high, you simply have to evacuate costal areas.
As far as I know, no warnings were issued.

Also, there is now criticism of government inaction in regional media, too, and I don't think that you want to blame them for "racism"...

[proud2BlibKansan]

25. Question

How much time passed from when the earthquake happened to when the tsunami hit the nearest coastline?

[ally_sc]

26. wonder if asia and middle east will start monitoring

conditions more closely and especially the activity in the indian sea after this massive loss of life?