Was racism factored into the decision not to warn Asia of the Tsunamis?

[Used and Abused]

I read a couple articles that said false Tsunami alarms could be very costly. But I doubt those false alarms are anywhere near as costly as 115,000 lives lost and climbing! I'm outraged. A western country would have been notified. In fact, our disrespectful media is already flirting with the remote possibility of a Tsunami occuring in the United States. (I call them disrespectful because of the way they are handling the coverage of the deaths--nothing more than a passing phrase before moving on to something more important)

[ClintonTyree]

1. I doubt it.................

it wasn't "*"'s decision or else I might agree with you. Some mid to low level schmuck probably screwed up or, lets face it. Communications in these poor countries leaves a lot to be desired.
I could be wrong, I hope I'm not.

[amber dog democrat]

2. I fear there are people who will haunted the rest of their lives

grappling with " what ifs" . i don't know what the truth is, nor do I want to blame - but yes, some kind of warning ought to have been given - as to how effective it would have been....

Still anyone monitoring the earthquake could have done more.

[tx_dem41]

3. Well, since the story is that these countries did not sign the treaty...

...that would have included them into the warning system....I doubt it.

[cali]

4. I also doubt it

and I don't think the press has been disrespectful. There's been a ton of coverage- whether for good reasons or sensationalism, I don't know- and the death toll has certainly not been minimized. I don't know how you could possibly reach that conclusion. In addition, there have been sevveral excellent editorials including one in the NYT this morning.

[tuvor]

17. Someone made the point on another thread

that the media was sensitive enough after the attacks on the World Trade Center not to show any carnage, but with this tragedy they're having a corpse field-day.

If that's true (haven't watched any news for days) then in that regard the press is being two-faced at least, if not disrespectful.

[Prodemsouth]

5. Economics. Could be man made- and we did it. Do you really think they

would have warned Europe. I don't. again it is based on Economics.

[fryguy]

10. please stop with the "tsunamis were caused by man" fantasies

there is just NO POSSIBLE WAY for humans to create a 9.0 earthquake or a 40+ foot tsunami wave/surge

[Prodemsouth]

13. Relax- ever heard of sarcasm.

n/t

[fryguy]

15. sorry

there've just been too many of those posts and threads. as someone who studied geology in college (and i'm not just talking intro "rocks for jocks) i get a bit defensive....

....besides, verbal inflections and cadences don't translate well to the internet so sarcasm often gets lost in translation....

:)

[Taxloss]

44. That's why it shouldn't be used.

eom

[tuvor]

16. This surely wasn't man-made, but

you can't say there's no possible way for it to be done. (The old you-can't-prove-a-negative maxim.)

[fryguy]

21. you're right - nothing can be proved for absolute certainty

there may always be a .00000000000000000000000000000000000000001% chance that something is or isn't true. so for that matter, I am unable to prove, to your desired level of certainty, that a 9.0 earthquake and resulting tsunamis were not caused by humans nor could it be said for absolute certainty that this entire world is little more than a program created by computers to keep us satiated while our body's serve as batteries to fuel their conquest of a scorched-sky planet.....why not start that conspiracy theory then? its just as likely to be true.....

[tuvor]

24. Just sayin' is all.

Hey, I'm university-educated, too. So when someone says "no possible way" and underlines it, I'm compelled to point it out. I expect the same if I do something similar.

Fair enough?

[fryguy]

28. fair enough

and while it certainly stretches the bounds of "possibility", I'll be sure next time to qualify my comments as "no REASONABLY possible way"

:toast:

[tuvor]

43. Cool. Thanks.

I also tend to be grumpier in the morning. Sorry if that came through.

Cheers!

[Must_B_Free]

34. if a jet can down a WTC

then man can make a 9.0

All it takes is the right energy in the right place.

[fryguy]

40. you gotta be kidding

there is no comparison between the two events in that respect

[sandnsea]

6. I read it was local decisions

So I doubt local officials were being racist towards themselves. But some westerners might want to consider their own responsibility in visiting places without any concern to the living conditions of the people in the countries they visit. Just like buying products with no concern to the living conditions of the workers who make the products. I also read that some earthquake scientists were trying to figure out how to warn people because they suspected a tsunami immediately. I can understand the countries hit in the first hour, but after that, cripes it's not like these areas don't have telephones. I really don't understand how people died in areas hit hours later.

[tx_dem41]

7. Excellent post...

I agree with everything you said, especially about the role of tourism in areas such as Phuket.

[phylny]

23. All they had to do was to contact

CNN, the BBC, etc. and everyone with a television or near a television might know.

[slutticus]

41. I think one of the things that happened was...

...that people were curious about the waves. Tsunamis usually occur in multiple waves, so after the first, I think people started crowding around the beaches to view the destruction.

When the other waves came, many more were killed. So I can imagine that warnings were eventually sent, and people probably said "It already came, I'm probably safe..." ...but they weren't safe.

This also may be why many animals weren't killed by the Tsunamis. The animals ran away the first time and didn't return. People are curious, so they may have stuck around too long.

[Egalitariat]

42. Will their standard of living be better if we quit visiting?****

nm

[fryguy]

8. very doubtful

the reports from people in the US and other nations that are part of the Pacific Tsunami network are that they knew of the earthquake but, lacking any sensors in the Indian Ocean, had no idea of the waves until the struck first land. And even at that point, had they been able to contact counterparts or leaders in the countries facing the waves, those countries lack any internal network to notify their populations. Which means US scientists would have called say Thai officials, for instance, but the Thai officials wouldn't have been able to get the word out to Phuket or Phi Phi.

[Warpy]

9. More likely tourism than racism

You know, don't want to cause a panic, don't want to cost the resorts money for nothing, don't want to discourage future tourists, all that sort of hogwash.

I doubt racism had a thing to do with it. Follow the money.

[rman]

11. asia was warned, asia did not warn it's population.

"because if there'd be no tsunami, a warning would have been the death of the tourism industry".
i guess they did not foresee that not warning could mean the death of tens of thousands of people. looks like wishfull thinking got the better of them.

one thing i know for sure now: i'll never go on vacation over there.
so much for tourism industry.

[theboss]

12. These countries aren't our children

The leaders of the country were warned as well as they could have been under the systems they chose to put in place.

I think it's somewhat racist to think that these countries need us to handle all their decisions.

[tuvor]

14. How much time did they have to warn effectively? 10 minutes? 20 minutes?

My feeling is that neglecting to warn effectively might well have been just a fuck-up that had massive consequences.

It happens all the time. I have no reason right now to believe that this was any different.

[rman]

22. 6 hours. n/t

-

[sybylla]

38. Six hours for Sri Lanka and India - not Indonesia

The wave that hit Sumatra, Indonesia and Thailand struck between a few minutes and one hour after the quake. Not much time to put out a warning to citizens even with a good public warning system in place. And you have to detect it first.

This is not a US made catastrophy. The governments in these countries let their people down. The never put detection nor warning systems in place. In some of these countries that may be due to racist/class reasons. :shrug: I don't know. But the blame for the loss of life cannot be put on the US govenment. We don't have a monopoly on geo-technology. You can't tell me that Japan didn't know of this as quickly as we did. In fact, I've heard reports on the CBC/NWI news that many of these governments had received warning of the possibility of a tsunami, they just either didn't or couldn't diseminate it to the people at risk.

I know how much fun it is to pin the problem on the ass in the Whitehouse, but this really wasn't our responsibility nor our fault.

[fryguy]

32. depends which countries/islands

the first waves hit sumatra very soon after the quake was registered, almost no chance to warn. in addition, without deep sea senors in the indian ocean, the scientists that detected the quake weren't even aware of the ensuing tsunami until it was first reported to be making landfall.

[TWiley]

18. Yes

It is certainly possible. A good warrior would strive to enhance the effect of a natural disaster inflicted upon his enemy. To effect this end anonymously would be perfect warfare.

Most likely, it was the low level of US business interests which indirectly influenced the decision.

[SheilaT]

19. Sigh. The lack of warning

had nothing to do with racism. It had to do with the fact that there simply is no warning system in the Indian Ocean, unlike in the Pacific Ocean. I doubt there's one in the Atlantic, so a major earthquake along the Mid-Atlantic ridge could create a tsunami that there'd be no warning about.

Setting up a warning system is fairly complicated, and needs any number of elements in place to make sure warnings get out. Think of a calling tree you may have participated in.

[Used and Abused]

29. Why isn't there a warning system in the Indian Ocean...

Things that make you go hmmm...

[ProdigalJunkMail]

35. because the governments did not wish

to pay the $$$ for the warning system. If I heard correctly the other day, the system requires investment of about $250,000 per sensor (earthquake/tsunami...I am not sure which).

theProdigal

[DinahMoeHum]

20. Apparently, Indonesian scientists have been trying to get such

a warning system in place for years.

Link:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/col/mdaly/

(snip)
The news reports about the killer tsunamis noted that there was no early warning system such as has long been deployed in the Pacific Ocean, supposedly because the phenomenon is so rare in the Indian Ocean.

In truth, Indonesian scientists have been pushing for a warning system in the Indian Ocean for at least seven years. Had such a system been in place there on Sunday, the Sri Lankans could have had two hours' warning or more. That train carrying 1,000 ill-fated souls from Colombo could have just returned to the safety of its station.

Back in June 1994, an earthquake in the Indian Ocean off the coast of East Java triggered a tsunami that killed 200. The danger of a future disaster in those waters was cited by an Indonesian scientist at the 1997 meeting of the UN's International Oceanographic Commission, or IOC.

"The idea of initiating the establishment of a Regional Tsunami Warning System in the Southwest Pacific and Indian Ocean was raised," an IOC report from the Lima, Peru, meeting notes.

The proposal apparently fell victim to either underfunding or bureaucratic sloth or both, but the Indonesians kept pushing. An Indonesian scientist reintroduced the idea at the IOC meeting in 2003 in Wellington, New Zealand. He noted that the notion had first been brought before the organization six years before.
(snip)


more...

"...either underfunding or bureaucratic sloth or both..."

Racism? I doubt it, since the Pacific warning system covers Pacific Rim countries such as China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam. . . and I haven't noticed anybody calling those peoples Western.

:-(

[Used and Abused]

30. Again, why wasn't there a warning system

even though the Indonesian scientists kept begging for one? Were they not important enough?

[ProdigalJunkMail]

36. who is supposed to put this in place?

could the indonesians and other asiatic countries have not put one together had they had the will to do so? Are you trying to suggest that the US have tsunami warning systems for the whole globe?

theProdigal

[mcscajun]

25. No, racism was certainly not a factor

Tsunamis are historically rare in the Indian Ocean. So, the countries there have no system for detection and alert as do those in the Pacific, where they are far more frequent.

No direct connection can be made between an occurrence of an earthquake of a certain magnitude and a resulting tsunami. Not all undersea quakes lift the ocean floor to displace the water needed to create a tsunami.

And it wasn't until the first wave hit Sri Lanka and initial news reports came in that the scientists made the connection and began their alert, as they knew the wave train would continue to move through the Indian Ocean.

The time factor involved was very small. There were dsicussions with the Sri Lankan ambassador, some in other impacted countries, and warnings delivered to some in the Thai government, and reports indicate they made the decision (not realizing the enormity of what they were facing) not to warn, based on the tourist industry and the consequences for a false alarm.

A Western country would not have much more warning, as we have no tsunami detection system for the Atlantic Ocean, either. Of course, now that we've seen what happened in the Indian Ocean, you can bet that any undersea quakes in the Atlantic will get far more attention.

[bleedingheart]

26. Money trumps human life all the time

whether it's the government afraid to warn tourists ...cuz perhaps they thought that it wouldn't be a big deal..and you don't want to miss out on those few extra hotel nights profits.

or the coal boss that doesn't employ safety regulations cuz it might just raise his costs a few pennies more...and who cares when there are always able bodied people ready to take the place of the dead.

[peacetalksforall]

27. They know that the tsunami travelled at 500 miles an hour. From

Sumatra, Indonesia, the closest point to the earthquake, to Colombo, Sri Lanka the air miles are a little less than 2000....so someone had nearly four hours to warn Sri Lanka and South India, less for other countries. Is there any good information about shipping, aircraft, or satellite warnings or in between island radio transmissions - why could they be so unprepared in Sri Lanka? Does anyone know of links regarding the timeline of reports? Will we find that government and commercial warning and news broadcasts failed or that they 'changed the exit poll results' (to hint at manipulation)?

[imabadman]

31. Actually, since this thing was moving @ 500 MPH

it would have been impossible to warn anyone in the immediate area. However, it a damn shame that people who were 1000 miles away were not warned.

[cattleman22]

33. Is Racism the reason there is no warning system on the East Coast of US?

[Uzybone]

46. Actually its bluism

those damn blue staters!!!!

[transeo]

37. They were warned - they didn't listen.

People jump to racism as a conclusion for everything so quickly! Scientists in the U.S. made many attempts to warn the governments around the Indian Ocean. In almost all cases they were ignored, or couldn't reach the right people in time. Additionally, some officials in the affected countries believed it would hurt the tourist industry, assuming it was a false alarm because tsunami's are so rare in that part of the world. Thailand is the only country that took it soemwhat seriously, but even there, they got the warning out too late.

[LiberalEconomist]

39. No, the only racist here is mother nature

That fucking bitch hates people with pigment. Mother nature is the biggest mass murderer known to humanity. The evil whore!!!

[SheilaT]

45. In 1946 an earthquake

somewhere in the Pacific (I have no idea where) created a tsunami that did a great deal of damage to Hilo, Hawaii. By 1948 a tsunami warning system was in place around the Pacific. The United States had the incentive and money to do so.

I just got done watching an excellent program about this on the National Geographic Channel.