WHEN I heard the news flash that there had been an earthquake measuring around 9 on the Richter scale with its epicentre in the open ocean near to Sumatra, I felt sick. The basic geological and geopolitical facts had calamity written all over them. What was more galling was that geologists at work around the world would have been fully aware of Sunday’s seismic event hours before the waves struck land. Lamentably, nobody knew whom to warn.
Despite our scientific brilliance, we can never tame this restless Earth. Nevertheless, commentators have been correct to point out that much more could have been done to provide an early warning of the spreading mayhem. Indeed, such warnings have long been available for the states ringing the much larger Pacific Ocean, where five or so tsunamis are recorded each year. Yet we hear remarkably little about them and the reason is simple. The wealthy democracies bordering the Pacific, including the United States, have developed a sophisticated seismic and satellite early warning system. In addition, the waves tend to travel longer distances than in the Indian Ocean, providing ample time to act on warnings.
But, warning system or no warning system, this was always going to be a massive disaster for two reasons, one unavoidable, the second avoidable. First, the geological location of the earthquake was particularly unfortunate. Generated from beneath the Indian Ocean along the great plate boundary and fault line that exists between the Indo-Australian and the European earth plates, the earthquake meant that ocean wave development — the creation of those deadly tsunamis — could take place unhindered in all directions, with every state of the Indian Ocean exposed to attack by the sea, from the Thailand-Malaysian peninsula to the East African coast. Nor would distance ease the pain; as in Sri Lanka, the mighty swell would be driven forward until it eventually hit land, bringing death and destruction in its wake.
Moreover, throughout the Indian Ocean, millions of poor people inhabit vulnerable low-lying coasts and islands, eking out a living from fishing, from the mangrove swamps, and from tourism. Unsurprisingly, the 500-mile-long Andaman and Nicobar Islands were badly hit. Geology and people were thus going to collide inexorably.
The second reason that this was going to be a major disaster is political. The excuses for not having urgent warning measures in place for the Indian Ocean are that tsunamis are rarer than in the Pacific and that the system would not justify the costs. Yet, the geological and satellite information is already being generated and should not be expensive to obtain. The question is thus not so much one of scientific expertise and cost but the international political will to share existing scientific expertise worldwide.
Technology itself is not enough. Warning systems only work if the civil authorities can use the information and devise simple plans for short-term defensive action. There were no local plans to evacuate people from the coast, and hotels were oblivious of impending doom. If even the most rudimentary structures had been in place, to issue alerts and to evacuate people a short distance from beach and bay, thousands of lives might have been saved. Unfortunately, such measures require effective regional and local government, something absent from many parts of South Asia. In the province of Aceh in northern Sumatra, where the Indonesian Government is waging a long-term war on rebel separatists, local government has broken down.
The brute fact is that contingency plans are most likely to be effective in democratic open societies with free, unfettered media. They rarely work in failing states dominated by small corrupt political elites.
Three things should follow on immediately from this tragedy. First, international and regional networks must be set up for all ocean areas to gather and share information on major seismic events. The argument of national security must not be allowed to prevent this from happening. The United States is far too defensive and ungenerous about sharing its data, even with its European allies.
Secondly, and even more importantly, ocean regions have to establish quick and effective mechanisms for issuing two to three-hour warnings of imminent threats.
Finally, each state must have in place systems for communicating warnings to coastal authorities and to hotels, which in turn should have their own local plans of evacuation.
In the longer term, much greater care must be paid to assisting development along coastlines that takes account of potential tidal waves. So often we wilfully expose ourselves to known geological dangers, yet are surprised when they happen.
This is not just a problem for the developing world. Anybody who has driven along the heavily congested coastal road from Naples to Sorrento will have stared in horror at the illegal housing that weak and corrupt local government in Italy has allowed to climb the slopes of Mount Vesuvius. The volcano is due for an eruption of the scale that buried Pompeii and Herculaneum. Yet, above the modern town of Ercolano, houses and villas hug the Mordor-like mountainside oblivious to the threat. And even with a warning, there is no way that traffic could clear the area quickly. Thousands will be killed.
We forget, at our peril, the innate restlessness of our planet. We in the West who are fortunate to inhabit the quieter geological regions of the Earth have a particular moral responsibility to assist those who do not.
Philip Stott is Emeritus Professor of Biogeography in the University of London
