This always comes about a week after some terrible disaster....what could we have done to prevent this?!

Does anyone ever LEARN from it? Not really...

It's just useless conjecture....Not that it's actually useless in a utopian sense, but we're pretty far away from that unattainable status....and it seems to be getting a bit redundant to think we can actually prevent things we don't even fully understand...

Maybe I'm just being overly pessimistic....

According to they did contact the Indonesian gov't, but the Indonesian gov't failed to respond "out of coutersy" to their tourist industry.

From what I heard from other sources, they again contacted, but the message reached too slow.

Remember tsunami happened very soon aftward the earthquake, maybe too quick for them to contact the others, or maybe just lack of care of human life.

Surf

I was watching a discovery channel info session about the actual forewarning of tsunami's and it was quite facinating. they explained that there might be a connection with the deep tremors felt when the tectonic plates shift a little in the ridge just off the coast of western canada and that it actually might be a trigger to the enormous release of energy that takes place during the earthquake responsible for a tsunami.

The lack of instrumentation for measuring the earthquake in the indian ocean area however makes actual readings scarce. The fact about the lack of warning might also be attributed to the fact that how do you warn an entire island like sri lanka or a good portion of india that there is a giant tsunami coming at them within a window of ten to twenty minutes its completly unrealistic. To effectively warn that many people takes minimum hours let alone the actual evacuation time.

I don't believe the fault for this catastrophe can be blamed on anybody but should be taken as a lesson to actually put more effort into subduction zone earthquakes and there precursor tremors.

Originally posted by Magickesists
how do you warn an entire island like sri lanka or a good portion of india that there is a giant tsunami coming at them within a window of ten to twenty minutes its completly unrealistic. To effectively warn that many people takes minimum hours let alone the actual evacuation time.

I don't know about Sri Lanka, but in India tsunami just attacked the edge of coastal cities and didn't come that much into the land.

Some people who died of tsunami in Chennai, India, were just passing by the ocean. It happened during morning hours when there were lot of people jogging and talking morning walks. A simple warning sign would have saved these people.

I am thankful that this didn't happen during evening hours when the beaches would have been filled up, thousdands more would have perished especially since that beach is the second longest in the world and very famous and also it was a sunday.
Whew...major disaster thwarted in Chennai.

Surf

Dude theres a confirmed death toll of 125000 and its estimated that 1000000 or more may be at risk due to diseases from all the dead bodies. there is also talk of an entire province of 400000 wiped out and the only reason that nobody knows is theres nobody left to say anything.
I don't think it was thwarted my friend far from it in fact.

Originally posted by Magickesists
Dude theres a confirmed death toll of 125000 and its estimated that 1000000 or more may be at risk due to diseases from all the dead bodies. there is also talk of an entire province of 400000 wiped out and the only reason that nobody knows is theres nobody left to say anything.
I don't think it was thwarted my friend far from it in fact.

My friend read the sentence over again.

"major disaster thwarted in chennai."

Chennai is the name of the city where I used to live. As in said in the previous post, if the tsunami had attacked later in the day, lot of people would have died in chennai, therefore a major disaster thwarted in chennai and chennai only.

By the confirmed toll is about 150,000, that is without taking into account the missing people, most of whom will make the tragedy list.

Surf

didn't check the death toll for a couple days didn't realize it was that bad.
Sorry about that i must go to bed as its 12 here and im tired might explain my answer.

All i know is thats the worst damn disaster the world has seen for quite some time possibly the worst yet.

Originally posted by Magickesists
didn't check the death toll for a couple days didn't realize it was that bad.
Sorry about that i must go to bed as its 12 here and im tired might explain my answer.

All i know is thats the worst damn disaster the world has seen for quite some time possibly the worst yet.

No problem, I have made quite enough mistakes like this to get the king position of mistakes.

The Earthquake in Iran in 2003 was bad, but no where close, about 41,000 dead or missing.

This one has 150,000 dead, and a lot missing. I hope the number doesn't cross 200,000 when they start adding missing to dead.

Surf

Edit: I take it back, Chinese Earthquake that occured in 1976, had about 750,000 deaths.

[edit on 1/4/2005 by surfup]

Originally posted by Azeari of the Radiant Eye

Allegedly, the only loaction in the region that received a proper, timely warning was the tiny island of Diego Garcia - an island with a US Navy Base!

Agreed, an early warning system should have been in place in the Indian Ocean (20/20 hindsight, you know), but wasn't because that area was not considered at risk for tsunami.

On a completely pragmatic note, it doesn't surprise me that the naval base was warned while local gov'ts were not. Have you ever tried to get a gov't worker on the phone early on a Sunday morning? Whereas our armed forces are alert and ready 24/7.

well maybe the states was jealous of india for having a new population record. Its not really a laughing matter but im morbid.

Anyway i think that the states naval base is probably justified in their response to the quake as the lack of earthquake measuremnt devices in that area of the world might also be an indication of poor telecomunications as well. the possibility that they had no phone numbers doesn't surprise me at all. and the fact is im sure they may have had to wait on hold to actually contact the right people even if they phoned an embassy by the time their call made it it might have been to late.

And the naval base being warned is something odd because i didn't think that boats would be at great risk from a tsunami unless docked because the wave is only a small ripple on the surface until the shoreline pushes it up.

This could be a very good thread for an investigation im certainly not gonna post again unless i have anything related to say with proof of actions and motivation on the matter.

Originally posted by sanctum
Was there a degree of the, "Nah', it will never happen" factor?

You bet there was. I don't think an tsunami has attacked India or Sri Lanka in the past century, which is why both nations aren't part of the international organization that deals with tsunamis.

Recently there was an earthquake, but contrary to what geologists speculated, there was no tsunami.

Surf

I was reading reports regarding this the day after the Tsunami struck... But basically no-one foresaw this happening. The Indian Ocean isnt really considered an Earthquake prone zone, despite there fault lines. Because there had never been anything of this magnitude in the region since Krakatoa in the late 1800's, no-one thought an early warning system would be neccesary.