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New tsunami warning

60 million people in the Bay of Bengal may be at risk.

The densely-populated Bay of Bengal looks to be at risk from very large tsunami-producing earthquakes, according to a new analysis of modern and historical observations.

Read the story here.

Posted by Nicola Jones on September 05, 2007
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I do hope this article will be read and heeded by the Indian and Bangladesh governments, although it is indeed difficult to even imagine the kind of "feasible preparedness" - the infrastructure and official mechanisms that is expected to swing into action in places with high population densities like for example, Dhaka or Kolkata - for an eventual evacuation - even if the warning comes in well ahead of the tsunami or the earthquake.
"A more sensible idea is to develop a global tsunami warning system that is fully integrated with an operational ocean-observing system — one that is regularly used for other related hazards, such as storm surges" (Alverson, 2005).
More than 2 years since that article and almost 3 since the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami - I am afraid that the region as a whole has still a long way to go to put in place an integrated multihazard warning system at the scientific or technical level, leave alone tailoring it for field application in the multiple socio-cultural contexts that prevail in the comunities potentially vulnerable.
I write this less as a scientist and more as a person living less than 50 meters away from the Bay of Bengal in south India!


Alverson, K. Nature 434, 683 - 683 (06 Apr 2005)

Posted by: Anupama | September 10, 2007 06:28 AM

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