cyclone.....the victims.....the despair......
Anger and Gloom are the words that best describe the sentiments of the victims of cyclonic storm that struck Orissa on 29th October. Gloom, because of man’s inability to prevent such elemental fury, and anger, because of the system’s failure to counter such happenings. Apart from the media coverage of the extent of the devastation and the rescue operations, the victims’ backlash at the state and centre’s establishment has received an equal attention from one and all. It is anger against the government for having failed to reach the affected area with proper relief. Such a scenario puts us back-to-square-one. A layman might think about the rumpus and hullabaloo created over India, jettisoning into the 21st century, armed with all the advanced technological armoury with it, but lacking the basic organisational infrastructure in place! According to a disaster management expert, working with the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, there are only 23 specially-built cyclone shelters in Orissa, built by German aid. The failure is all the more explicable because with the advanced tools like satellites, the cyclone was reliably forecasted two days ahead. The Cyclone Warning Dissemination System (CWDS), developed by Ahmedabad-based Space Application Centre, makes use of INSAT satellites capability to broadcast direct to the community. However, reports from the coastal districts of Orissa suggest that though the fishermen were informed of the cyclone, no information was forthcoming about its destructive nature. Development and timely utilisation of disaster management techniques using GIS and remote sensing are essential for these coastal regions. Cyclone prediction model that can predict the severity of an impeding storm atleast 12 hrs in advance has been developed by IIT, can be made use of. And above all, a full machinery should always be in order for pre-disaster evacuation and post-disaster relief work, with mock drills once in a while. All these can be monitored through a base control station. | ||
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