BANGKOK, Thailand – The extraordinary loss of life from Sunday’s earthquake and tsunami waves is prompting Asian governments to consider developing a more comprehensive and effective warning system.
Scientists nearest the quake’s epicenter knew shockwaves could create tidal surges, but said Monday they had no way of measuring the size of the danger because a warning network like one used in the Pacific is not installed in the Indian Ocean.
The Pacific has an underwater tsunami-detection system of five buoys nestled strategically on the ocean floor at depths of up to 18,000 feet. Three of the devices are off the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, one is off Vancouver, B.C., and one is off Oregon.
Having such technology might have saved countless lives Sunday by tracking the path of the waves and giving residents in coastal areas time to flee to higher ground.
Officials in Thailand issued the only warnings of the impending disaster, but broadcasts beamed to tourist resorts in the country’s south underestimated the threat, and a Web site caution was not posted until three hours after the first waves hit.
U.N. Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland, who is also the U.N. emergency relief coordinator, said he was not aware the region didn’t have a warning system.
Egeland said the World Conference on Disaster Reduction next month in Kobe, Japan, will now consider whether such a system can be designed and whether it is even possible to evacuate such large coastlines with only a few hours’ notice.
India’s information minister, Dayanidhi Maran, said his country would consider setting up a warning system, and Australian Prime Minister John Howard said he would investigate what role his country could play in the effort. Japan’s government also indicated it would lend expertise developed from the Pacific alert system.
Harley Benz of the U.S. Geological Survey’s national earthquake information service in Golden, Colo., said a basic system of seismic sensors and tide gauges could be set up within two years.
Such a system presumes, however, an organized communication system and widely understood procedures and discipline by hotel operators, fishing villages and local authorities to clear the coastline quickly in case of a coming disaster.
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