The Hindu : National : New information service to support emergency managers

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jan 02, 2005

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National

New information service to support emergency managers

By Vinay Kumar

NEW DELHI, JAN. 1. The Pacific Disaster Center in Maui, Hawaii, has launched an initiative to support emergency managers responding to the tsunami disaster in South and Southeast Asia.

Called the Indian Ocean Tsunami Geospatial Information Service, the initiative is part of the Center's Asia Pacific Natural Hazards Information Network, a resource for disaster managers to tap into high-quality geospatial data to reduce disaster risk and vulnerability in the region. It will provide information specific to the tsunami that has claimed more than 1,00,000 lives.

Chris Chiesa, senior manager of the Hawaii-based Center, said it would provide baseline Landsat imagery, SRTM-derived shaded relief images, LANDSCAN-derived population density, detailed coastlines, damage polygons, and high-resolution imagery as it becomes available.

The Pacific Disaster Center provides applied information research and analysis for the development of more effective policies, institutions, programs, and information products for disaster-management and humanitarian assistance communities of the Asia-Pacific region and beyond.

Allen Clark, senior research fellow and executive director of the Center, said the organisation, with the data available to it, put out a disaster notification alert to all emergency managers in Hawaii and elsewhere. "The real tragedy of all this is that the system is there, the technology is there, the capability is there, it just wasn't in place in the Indian Ocean when the thing hit."

State of preparedness

Charles E. Morrison, president, East-West Center, which is managing partner of the Pacific Disaster Center, said the two institutions "stand prepared" to do what they can to enhance tsunami warning systems in the Indian Ocean. He said the two centres may host an international workshop for South and South-East Asian countries to discuss a regional tsunami warning system. Participants could visit Honolulu tsunami facilities.

Jefferson Fox, senior fellow in environment, East-West Center, said it was too early to assess the environmental impact of the recent tsunami.

It was immediately evident, however, that it would also kill coral reefs throughout the region. According to Thai marine scientist, Thon Thamrongnawasawasdi, the impact was irreversible.

"We will never get back the past richness. They will never be the same again," he said.

Low-lying islands hit

Among the areas hit worst by the waves are the low-lying Andaman and Nicobar islands. Already vulnerable to sea-level rise tied to global warming, they were swamped by the tsunami. One of the first environmental risks for these islands is to fresh water.

Salt water will poison reservoirs of rainwater, environmentalists fear.

Fires resulting from oil spills or combustion from damaged ships in port, or from ruptured coastal oil storage and refinery facilities, can cause damage greater than that inflicted directly by the tsunami.

Officials from Cairn Energy reported that their offshore operations in Andhra Pradesh and in the Bay of Bengal off Bangladesh were working as normal. Cairn Energy is exploring for oil and gas in the Krishna Godavari deep sea, off the Andhra coast, and is the operator of the Ravva oil and gas fields, which produces 54,000 barrels of crude oil every day.

Work has not been affected at the Sangu gas field and drilling operations in the Bay of Bengal are on.

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