tsunami 2004 - INDIA

[Sujatha]

Disease epidemics could double the death toll in India"s tidal wave catastrophe

It is a fact that rotting corpses, smashed sewers and contaminated water combined with a lack of food and shelter, along with mosquito-borne diseases such as dengue fever and malaria, could wipe out weakened survivors.



I feel verymuch guilty and that I am unable to be there for medical services.



I was about to post my tour topics, which I have postponed temporarily.

[Raju]

What s latest situation at coastal AP?

[Jaszalcatraz]

Today I saw a procession being taken out by the communists to ask people to donate liberally for the victims.....can anyone tell me what are the places organizations to donate to.

[Habitual Perfectionist]

You can make donations to the Prime Minister's relief fund. The address is :



Prime Minister's National Relief Fund

Prime Minister's Office

South Block, New Delhi 110011

India





Alternatively, you can make the payment at any of these banks :



1) State Bank of India

2) Central Bank of India

3) Union bank of India

4) Dena Bank

5) Syndicate Bank

6) Corporation Bank

7) Bank of India

Indian Overseas Bank

9) Punjab National Bank

10) Indian Bank

11) Allahabad Bank

12) CitiBank

[Jaszalcatraz]

The problem with giving to the government is that ur always unsure whether everything you're giving will be used properly or kuch politicans khaalenge.

That's the first question I asked myself when I saw the communists.....if I gave them a donation...will they use it honestly or has corruption reached them too.

I guess private organizations mentioned in the other thread are the best choice.

[Habitual Perfectionist]

IMO...things are not all that white with private funds either. I remember the TOI group collecting lakhs of rupees after the Gujarat earthquake...but hardly saw any of it being used except for a few ceremonies where TOI officials were felicitated and a few blankets and clothes distributed. Don't think the cost of those clothes went into lakhs.

[Jaszalcatraz]

IMO...things are not all that white with private funds either. I remember the TOI group collecting lakhs of rupees after the Gujarat earthquake...but hardly saw any of it being used except for a few ceremonies where TOI officials were felicitated and a few blankets and clothes distributed. Don't think the cost of those clothes went into lakhs.

One of the biggest such project taken up by the media in recent times was by India Today for the Kargil Jawans. They collected shit-load of money but i think they rehabilatated around 50 injured soldiers only.

But the rehabilitation was total...they got houses and a small business like a phone booth or shop.

[Habitual Perfectionist]

The best way would be to do some research on which NGO's are actively involved in the rescue and rehabilitation operations and get in touch with them directly. I did that in Gujarat. Even went to Bhuj with a team from the NGO.



This way, you can be reasonably sure of your money being in safer hands.

[CtrlAltDel]

beware of so-called 'NGO's who go door to door or haunt busstops collecting donations....

[DQ]

The best way would be to do some research on which NGO's are actively involved in the rescue and rehabilitation operations and get in touch with them directly. I did that in Gujarat. Even went to Bhuj with a team from the NGO.

This way, you can be reasonably sure of your money being in safer hands.

Yea a good way.



Actually we need to build a global group of people who will serve communities without any Bias.



Who adress the needs at the micro level. Maybe working with their own communities.



As in this incident, I can recollect Chennai has a acute water shortage, on normal days people in areas like triplicane wait for over 3-4 hrs for a pot of water. What hell may be running loose now.



If the govt couldn't provide water to them normally, god knows what the scenario is in these circumstances.



Its a pity that in such a large country we do not have geninune people to work and help in times of need. We should have teams ready to assist internationally, but alas we cannot help ourselves.

[DQ]

Thursday, 30 December, 2004, 06:52 GMT


India state issues tsunami alert

[Sharjeel]

That was a very terrible calamity.



I have afriend in Delhi who is a social servant. I will try and ask her about the things we people can do to help. Hope she points me in the right direction.



I wil have to get hold of her first...

[CtrlAltDel]

I wil have to get hold of her first...

oh...she likes to play rough, eh?

[Jaszalcatraz]

I wil have to get hold of her first...

oh...she likes to play rough, eh?

Kya CAD bhai...is thread pe bhi?? Kal raat HP bhai meri gaand phode....nahi dekhe aap? Check out Two classic in sync thread.



By the way I have seen the err of my ways and swear not to spam on meaningful threads anymore.

[CtrlAltDel]

I wil have to get hold of her first...

oh...she likes to play rough, eh?

Kya CAD bhai...is thread pe bhi?? Kal raat HP bhai meri gaand phode....nahi dekhe aap? Check out Two classic in sync thread.

By the way I have seen the err of my ways and swear not to spam on meaningful threads anymore.

i know...i forgot what the thread was abt b4 i posted that.......kya karen, puraani aadat jo tehri...



damn....for the zillionth time, i wish there was an Edit feature...

[san]

Such a terrible thing to happen. Hope the early warning system is implemented & used efficiently in case of such incidents in the future.

[Red Combat]

Disclaimer : Not sure how true this is. Got it from a friend as FW:FW:FW: mail . Googling now to find the source of origin.



NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 29: At 7.50 am on Black Sunday, more than one full hour before the tidal waves hit the Tamil Nadu coast, the top brass of the Indian Air Force knew that the Car Nicobar Air Base had been inundated.





But it was only 41 minutes later—during which time the waves were heading west—that the first communique went out from the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) to the Government. And the Crisis Management Group, the Government’s nodal emergency response unit, met at 1 pm by when the tsunami had come, killed and gone.



And guess who got this first IMD communique? It was sent at 8.54 am to the residence of Murli Manohar Joshi, former Science and Technology Minister rather than his successor Kapil Sibal.





It’s always easier to find faults with the benefit of hindsight—especially in an unprecedented disaster like this one—but an investigation of the sequence of events after the quake hit Sumatra at 6.29 am shows a glaring disconnect between different agencies of the Government. And highlights how precious time—that could have been used to issue warnings and maybe save some lives—was lost.



Consider the sequence of events:





• ‘‘At 7.30 am, we were informed by our Chennai unit that coordinates the logistics for the Car Nicobar base about a massive earthquake near Andamans and Nicobar,’’ Air Chief S Krishnaswamy told The Indian Express today.





‘‘But communication links went down in the Island Territories, the Chennai unit could only raise Car Nicobar base on the high frequency set at 7.50 am ... the last message from Car Nicobar base was that the island is sinking and there is water all over.’’





• At 8.15 am, the Air Chief says, he asked his Assistant Chief of Air Staff (Operations) to alert the Defence Ministry.





Now cut to the civilian establishment.





• Unaware of its fax goof-up, the IMD, as per routine, sent another fax to the Disaster Control Room in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) at 9.14 am.





• Eight minutes later, Cabinet Secretary B K Chaturvedi’s private secretary was also brought into the loop.





• At 10.30, the director of the Control Room T. Swami informed Cabinet Secretariat officials.





• By then the tsunami had hit the Chennai coastline and another earthquake measuring 7.3 struck 60 miles west of Indira Point at 9.53 am.





What happened between 6.29 am and 8.56 am in the IMD is also telling: it shows how the country’s premier met agency works in isolation during an unprecedented emergency.





So even as IMD stations in Chennai, Vishakhapatnam and Kolkata began started receiving after-shock signals within minutes of the main earthquake, and while the rest of the world had already issued the exact epicentre of the earthquake—and the Pacific warning system had sounded a tidal wave alert—the IMD was doing its own calculations to find out the magnitude and epicentre of the earthquake.





Not helping the IMD was the fact that the Andaman station in Port Blair runs on an old, analog system rather than a digital one. In other words, in the event of a large earthquake and frequent after-shocks, what it registered was a ‘‘clipped seismograph’’ —a blank sheet of paper instead of zig-zag lines.





This is exactly what happened.





‘‘For computing the exact epicentre, we need data from three stations in three directions. With Andamans out of operations, it took us longer than expected,’’ explained the duty officer.





By then, the after-shocks had begun at Andamans. The first one was at 7:19 am of magnitude 5.9 on the richter scale. It is not clear whether that was enough to sound the warning bells.





‘‘Tsunamis are never recorded in Indian history, so it did not occur to us,’’ said R S Dattatrayam, director seismology at IMD, who arrived after 8.30 am to the station after being informed. ‘‘I don’t recall the exact sequence of events.’

[Red Combat]

Ok, It was reported by Indian Express.

Here is the link http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=61766

[Sujatha]

Today also big FU has taken place.



Home ministry issues an national alert ON SECOND TSUNAMI in morning.



Andaman&Nicobar Lt Governer gives public alert that another tsunami will hit shortly.



After some time based on Home ministry alerts people from Andaman

and Tamilnadu become highly panicky.All are being evacuated from coastal areas/ almost chasen away from the coasts.



Not only these states, but people from Thailand also runs away from coasts out of utter panic because of Indian home ministry alerts. I saw the video im CNN.



Fine after a few minutes, Mr Kapil Sibal - Science Minister , says there is no such second tsunami threat.



Each ministry is pointing the finger towards other ministry. Kapil Sibal is quoting the reports of a private geo concern in US.



Home ministry is pointing to some other source(Pacific Rim)



In India during the Thuglak rule they changed the capitol from Delhi to Thuglakabad (some where in Maharashtra).After a while they reshifted the capitol to Delhi.Thousands of people suffered.



I think today so many confusion has taken by the statements of irresponsible central ministers.



People are just goats in this country.