God bless the tsunami vicitms and families

[Edge]

... in response to Re: Re: God bless the tsunami vicitms an..., posted by Gary Bala on Dec 29, 2004

Gary - I hope all is well with any of your relatives in India.  Unbelievable what has happened there...

[Gary Bala]

... in response to Re: Re: Re: God bless the tsunami vicitm..., posted by Edge on Dec 30, 2004

Thanks, Edge and Zack, for the sympathies.

One of my uncles owned a home on
the coastline which was obviously wiped out,
but he and others are out of danger for now.

Yes, the worldwide effort and coalition is
huge and unprecedented, but the final
count of damage will probably be into
the billions spread over 11 countries, with untold
loss of life and injury. Long term reconstruction
will take years. As President Bush said, everyone
believes though that in the end the community
of nations will prevail over the destruction.

I also hope that a worldwide disaster warning
system can be devised to help people protect
themselves against future disasters.
Gary

[zack]

... in response to Re: Re: Re: Re: God bless the tsunami vi..., posted by Gary Bala on Dec 30, 2004

Gary,

Actually, warning devices for tsunamis already exist. I'm assuming that the rareity of tsunamis is what prevented them from being implemented. They are floating devices that are placed several miles from the shore line which sense severe changes in wave height, which in turn sounds an alarm. Only a 15 minute warning would have saved the lives of most of the victims (sad to think about). I would guess that after this event they will be implemented permanently in high risk areas.

Zack

[Gary Bala]

... in response to Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: God bless the tsunam..., posted by zack on Dec 30, 2004

Thanks for the info.

Yes, I was aware that such a floating device system
relaying data signals to orbiting satellites gives tsunami
warnings in the Pacific Ocean, and has dramatically
cut down injury and death for example in the Hawaiian
Island chain.

I was referring more to a global wide system
covering all continents and oceans and
covering all types of disasters, paid for by all
of the world's countries, which would all then
benefit from the warnings. Also, new imaginative
ways need to be investigated concerning warning
of major disasters. For example, reports are that some
wild animals in the Indian Ocean sensed an impending storm
with their built-in radar, and moved inland to avoid injury.
Maybe just studying wild life movement and migration can
give some clues to on-coming disasters.

The UN will hold a World Conference on Disaster Reduction
from Jan. 18 to 22, 2005 in Kobe, Japan, site of the Jan. 1995
earthquake, and all the top global climate and warning experts
will discuss all this, and hopefully something good will come from it.

Thanks again.