Catastrophy in Asia
 

Not quite sure where to put this but I believe such news fit here.

I haven't seen a thread on this subject so I thought I'd start one. Any thoughts or comments on what is currently going on in Asia? They say it's the biggest catastrophy in modern time. I look at all these people on TV talking about all their family and friends that they've lost, and it's really sad. Apparently there are over 70 000 deaths (?) and many wounded and missing.

yep, it's the biggest earthquake ever recorded, a 9.2 i believe :( i dont even know what the proper thing to say is. *siiigh* i feel extremely stuid now :( :bum:

My comment is that this catastrophy showcases the huge rift between the rich and poor countries - most of the victims were poor people who lived in something like houses in places that were not supposed to live. We - as the part of the developed world - are ok with exploiting these poor people at our convenience and remember them once such a catastrophy takes place. The rest were tourists residing in hotels that were not supposed to be there. That showcases another catastrophy, the one caused by the human to the environment ( and which of course turns against the human herself. )
They say that the victims of the tsunami might reach or exceed 100.000. This is so much bigger than 9/11 and I feel sorry for the victims but at least they didn't suffer much. They were swept away.

I also said to somebody - this is "God's Christmas gift to humanity" and she was upset about it. I don't think it's so much different than saying that it was "God's will". It depends on the way you see it.

Well, you CAN see it from a cynical point of view, but there are also other aspects of it. I like how humanitarian organizations responded, and how people are giving contributions for basic aid and rescue effords. Many people do care when they see something like that happening to fellow human beings. It shows a level of altruism that seperates us from the animals at least.

I think it become catastrophy because no one expect such thing would happened in such area. I live in Malaysia .. we don't have earth quake... we are not even in the zone. In another word . its not suppose to happened here. But it did.

700km/hr wave force .. that hit the effected countries within 2 hours after the first earth quake.. even it posible to detect with those sophisticated equipment.. but it does sound too late to warn those victims..

My friend, a Christian lady .. she said . its not work of God .. its the work of devil... that God would never do such thing.

But my thoughts just wonder .. with such technology we have in this century..how man could build a nuclear proof tunnel far far down under the earth and cannot be detect with satelite which can see at least until 20 kms under the ground ( urrg.. can't remember.) .. you know.. whats going on under there? what actually the cause to the ..what was it call.. "earth plate" something to moved up that caused the big waves..

God's will? ..to me.. yes... because it happened.. for what reason? only God knows how and why...


PS: On Monday after the Sunday disaster .. I had to be at Petronas Tower on 49th floor at 8am where most people only start working at 9am. Late Sunday night was reading report that the tremor still going on once in like every few hours and will continue for few days more .. was I scared? hell .. yes!

a second earthquake have just happened again in Aceh, Indonesia 6 hours ago ..... the last count 45,000 died there >.< :( :(

if this is really God's will , i hope this disaster will bring good things to the victims in the future

No, the largest recorded Earthquake was in Chile, it was 9.5, the 2nd biggest was a 9.2 in Alaska, this is now the 3rd or 4th largest with 9.0...

I've been following the news of this earthquake more than i did 911, i realised that a few people from school could be effected (My new RA is from Sri Lanka even and did go home for our winter break)... so, i'm a bit paranoid, hehe. I also find all this geology stuff fascinating and love hearing the geologists talk.

Supposedly, the force of both this Earthquake and the 7.0 Earthquake south of Australia that happened earlier that day, the planet shook on it's axis and the day was shortened by 3 miliseconds... how interesting!

I don't understand how this can be "God's will". What could possibly be GOOD when it comes to this disaster? People get help, and that's good, maybe they will be more prepared now and that's good too but think of all the people who died, all the people who lost friends, family, all the wounded people. The hospitals are full and there's a big risk for infection as there's not enough medicine and no air conditioning. Corpses are layed out all over temples to be identified. Seeing something good out of this situation is just about seeing the positive things. But maybe I just think that way 'cause I don't believe in god. And if he really does exist then he must be completely out of his mind.

God's work! Devil's work! Why to go in there generally? The tectonic plates moved and caused the earthquake. Since the plates moved under the water, it caused those waves. The technology for detection in that area is not set but the signal was registered. Thai authorities knew it but chose not to cause panic.

Well now, the fact of a natural disaster is here. Now people help each other at the locations and throughout the world. People will help people and not any God or any Devil for that matter.

To spy & Co.:
I heard today one person said that the catastrophy cause some poplulation reduction in Asia and that will make some vacancies for the jobs. Certainly, the cynicism has no limits.

well.. last time we talked about how we should control the world population .. now we see how nature handle it .. its way...

So I guess ...that tectonic plates .. we cannot control it..

I just watched yet another report on TV and it showed a man re-uniting with his 2-year old son. The boy has been called "The miracle boy". You can check a clip with them here. I just look at the boy and feel so sorry for him.. I mean, his expression is so blank. Either he doesn't understand what has happened or... well, I think it's post traumatical stress... His face expression is so blank..

This is such a tradegy, but I still can't help thinking differently. Why don't we see any special mentions about the starving children in Africa? Swedish television mentioned just Swedes in their reports, which is understandable, but you would have thought they could mention people from Germany of Finland or any other country ONCE.

Kind of hard to express myself. :/

Yes, including newspapers. Seems like the catastrophy is about Scandinavians only. :hmmm:
Anyway, UN reports that ca. 5 000 000 people are in a huge need of basic help like fresh water, food and simple sanitary means. First help from Australia seemed to have arrived already. The devistation in South Asia is total and International Health Organisation fears that the number of dead will be doubled as a result of infections and contageous deseases.

The funny thing was, people asked the people in Sweden who are "held responsible" (I don't know how to explain this) why they don't ask for help from big countries like USA. And I must say the room went very quiet and then you could hear "Uuhhmm... ehhh..." :lol:

The water etc. makes it even worse. If there was clean water, medicine, healthy air etc. it wouldn't have been as bad as it is. But you can't really expect more, besides, everyone is in shock and the hospitals are completely full and there isn't much time.

I saw that press-conference live and yes, some answers were not given and some are ended up by talking around. Sad, certainly sad. They had to recognise that they didn't realise the grade of the destruction directly. I guess that's the most right answer why they didn't act fast enough and why they didn't ask for help. Pride? :rolleyes: You just may guess ...

Western survivors will come back to their safe homes with lots of everything while Asian local population is left with thousands of corpses those can't be even burried or burnt because the West asked not to in order to be able to identify its citizens. It's such a hard dilemma.

What can I do to help? Will probably send some money to the Asian fund. That's all I can do.

Yeah but this was bound to happen. Why don't we get it together when we don't have to face a catastrophy like that one is beyond me. And India say they don't need any help :rolleyes:

The latest count is 130,000 dead.


This is probably the biggest natural catastrophy since antiquity (in terms of the amount of kinetic energy involved, the planet even shifted on its axis).

Humanity has been rather lucky during the last centuries, there has been no major natural catastrophic events, this one is a reminder that such things exist, and this one was still a "regular" tsunami, there is worse:

- Mega-tsunamis. Contrary to tsunamis that are caused by submarine earthquakes, mega-tsunamis are caused by massive landslides that generate waves that are several hundred meters high and travel at over 900 km/h.

- Supervolcanoes. Instead of erupting regularly like standard volcanoes, supervolcanoes are pockets of magma that build up during thousands of years until they finally explode. The supervolcano of Yellowstone is the most studied on the planet since it could explode anyday, when it does, a third of the US will be destroyed.

http://img145.exs.cx/my.php?loc=img1...uumiita4ft.jpg :(

It's the same in Denmark.. The huge headline tells the story of 419 Danes missing (7 dead so far) while a minor headline says that above 118.000 died in total. Why is it that the focus is so out of perspective?

:eek: That's awful.. you can see all the dead people lying there.. :(

I learned in an email today that one of my colleagues and several members of his family are believed to have been killed by the tsunami in Sri Lanka.

Early British coverage was obsessed about what had happened to British people, but that changed as the scale of the disaster unfolded. But relatively few British people are believed to have died, whereas over 1,000 Swedes are feared to have died.

At over 130,000 dead so far, this earthquake is clearly the worst natural disaster since the cyclone that killed 138,000 people in Bangladesh in 1991. It's also on the same scale as the 143,000 people that died in the Tokyo earthquake of 1923. It's obviously going to overtake them in terms of numbers killed.

About 200,000 people died in the Gansu earthquake of 1920 and another 200,000 in the Tsinghai earthquake of 1927.

The two biggest natural disasters of the 20th century were the 1970 cyclone that killed 300,000 to 500,000 people in Bangladesh and the 1976 Tangshan earthquake in China that officially killed 242,000 people and unofficially is estimated to have killed 650,000 to 750,000.

The worst natural disasters in recorded history are the 1887 Yellow River flood which killed about 900,000 people and the 1556 Shansi earthquake also in China which killed 830,000 people. An earthquake in 1201 in Egypt and Syria may have killed over a million people.

What's unique about this disaster is not the loss of life, but its geographical spread. And because so many visitors were caught up in it, it's affected people around the world.