Thursday, May 22, 2008

Disaster Readiness Plan


I remember watching "Ring of Fire" in IMAX format way back in 1991 at Singapore Science Center's Omni-theater. It was a show that I cannot forget. I have also hiked up solo to some volcanoes in Sumatra and Java, the views are breath-taking, but if you can visualize the danger of the volcanoes erupting like the Krakatau (Krakatau movie, Krakatau Clay Animation), the casualty will be enormous. Malaysia lies just on the outskirt of this Ring and can be seriously affected.

Malaysian politicians before the 2004 Tsunami in their speeches like to say that our country is free from natural disasters and so on. When, I hear this, in my thought, I think the politicians need to watch the documentary and study geography.

The Nargis cyclone and Chengdu earthquake show how important to have a practicable Disaster Readiness Plan. There are many types of natural, biological, or man-made disasters. Our existing disaster plans are mainly for the annual monsoon that lashes the east coast of our country, tsunami and may be the perennial haze.

Malaysia existing early warning system for Tsunami is the best in Asean(there is still room for a lot of improvement). I know that, because I had the privileged of setting up a small portion of this system( I am the coolie). But, my concern is not the technical or theoretical issues, it is on the practical ones.

For example, if we received an early warning system for a 9.1 Richter earthquake in the Andaman Sea, how are the coastal residents of Seberang Perai, Northern Perak, Pulau Langkawi, Kedah & Perlis going to be informed(theory are by sms, TV and radio - imagine if it happened when nearly everyone is asleep like in Myanmar during the Nargis cyclone), how to evacuate, where to evacuate, how fast can disaster teams be mobilized,etc. The government had actually installed early warning sirens in a few locations, but I am quite sure many residents do not know what to do except run helter-skelter. The are many other possible scenario, all have to be planned for....

P.S. Ordinary citizen do not know that weekly there are minor quakes in our region, the meteorological department staff receive frequent automated SMSes on hand-phones.

10 comments:

Jason ANG Kian You , 汪建佑 said...

i think malaysia should be safe right ?

Unknown said...

Good post. Thanks for the info.

khaw veon szu said...

Thank for this very informative posting. And very timely as well.

fujiwara said...

DATO' FISHHOOK, YOU ARE HERE TO PUT 1 LINE KAH? DO YOU THINK IT'S VERY CONSTRUCTIVE ENOUGH?

WE ALL KNOW IT'S A GOOD POST!

Unknown said...

Fujiwara,

Well at least I told the blogger he did a good job and thanked him for it. That's constructive because it affirms the blogger so that he can be inspired to write more of such posts.

fujiwara said...

Wooh....

Look like some one is here to "bodek" HKL.....Bravo!!!

Keep it up....it is so constructive

Cheers!!!

Unknown said...

Oh wise fujiwara,

I humbly beg for your guidance to teach me how to write a comment so that it is constructive and yet not bodeking in nature.

Please oh pretty please help...

fujiwara said...

Oh ya, fishhook...thanks for your humble request, i think you are better than me in "bodeking" kung fu. In addition to this, though that you able to teach me some technique for constructive and bodeking skill.

Sound like humaliting yourself for these but its ok, we learn and share each other knowledge through this forum for betterment. To be honest, why i said your words/sentenses is constructive enough because it is full of excitement in your sentenses and somemore everywords from your hand is full of "tulang" and "bombastic". I think from this point of view, others reader will also agree with my words. Thus, we shall learn from you more. I think you are gentle enough to welcome us to learn from you right??

Unknown said...

fujiwara,

I rest my case with you. In your 3 comments here, it's all personal attacks directed to me and have nothing to do with the topic, and in two comments you try to speak for everyone ("WE ALL KNOW IT'S A GOOD POST!", "others reader will also agree with my words."). Let them speak for themselves. You're not the only one who know how to post comments.

This shall be my last reply to you unless you have something actually related to the topics being posted to say.

fujiwara said...

Dear Fishhook,

Did i ask you to reply?
Come on bro.....