The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Tsunami alert sparks panic along coast

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Dec 31, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Tsunami alert sparks panic along coast

By Our Tamil Nadu Bureau

The Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, addressing fishermen at a relief camp at Colachel. — Photo: A. Shaikmohideen

CHENNAI, DEC. 30. The tsunami alert sounded by the Union Government and repeated broadcast of the information all morning today sent panic waves along the coastal districts of Tamil Nadu.

On a day when both the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, and the Chief Minister, Jayalalithaa, were scheduled to separately visit the badly-affected villages and comfort the affected families, the order to clear the coast for at least a two-kilometre stretch posed serious problems all round.

Whole villages and even towns got evacuated in 30-60 minutes in the forenoon. They looked like ghost towns. Aside from the fishing hamlets in the affected districts, Nagapattinam, Tuticorin, Ramanathapuram, Tirunelveli and Nagercoil towns, not to mention the villages between Chennai and Pondicherry, witnessed this "great escape."

All available vehicles were filled with people and those without access to one, got on to bullock-carts or just took to their heels. They certainly did not want to see or be consumed by another tsunami.

There was panic, chaos and confusion. Rumours took over and it was in the air that the sea was furious and waters had entered this village or that part of a city. It all started with a `news flash' from Kerala, quoting the Chief Minister as saying that the Union Home Ministry had issued a tsunami warning and that people along the coast should evacuate. What applied to Kerala, applied to all coastal southern States and Tamil Nadu also received the alert from New Delhi. In Chennai, the city police cordoned off the entire stretch of the Marina and blocked all approach roads. The fisherfolk on the coast were asked to leave immediately, but they came up to the main road and waited for a `de-alert.' Government offices, public sector undertakings and many shops and offices declared a holiday, as many of the employees began rushing home. Houses and flats on the coastline began emptying fast, but residents on the first or second floors gathered the courage to stay on, lest the looters take over. Police patrols were arranged for safety.

The critical hours passed and by 1.30 p.m., officials became restive. They had no fresh word from Delhi and the local meteorological office declared that there was no tsunami coming. Gradually, the tension yielded place to relief. But there was a lurking fear as the people felt that the water was rising in the sea.

At the bottom of it all was the burning question — Was it a real alert or only an emergency drill? According to officials here, it was only an alert on rising sea levels and not a tsunami. A search of all web sites — from American to Australian — gave no answers. When they contacted Delhi, there was no authentic confirmation about the gravity of the situation and nobody wanted to take any chance after what happened on Sunday.

By late evening, officials lowered the guard, but the police decided to remain on alert and keep preventive measures in place. The tangible result was that the Prime Minister did not land at Karaikal or Nagapattinam and the Chief Minister stopped briefly at Cuddalore and Nagapattinam before proceeding to Colachel. Dr. Singh began his day at Colachel and went back to Thiruvananthapuram after an aerial survey of the Tamil Nadu coast and a brief stopover at Tiruchi.

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