Publication details

Publisher(s)	IFRC (2005)

Description

Looking back over the events of 2004, it is striking how many of the year’s disasters could have been avoided with better information and communication. For tens of thousands of people, disaster arrived suddenly, unannounced.

The tsunami, which wrecked so many lives, homes and livelihoods last December, looms large in this year’s report. Although scientists across the region had the technology to register the massive earthquake off Sumatra which triggered the tragedy, they lacked the means to tell people what was coming or what to do.

Yet informal networks succeeded where official warnings failed: Vijayakumar Gunasekaran, based in Singapore, heard of the tsunami’s devastating impact on the radio early on the morning of 26 December. He phoned a warning through to his family in Nallavadu on the eastern coast of India, in time for villagers to evacuate all 3,630 residents to safety.

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http://www.ifrc.org/publicat/wdr2005

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Posted October 6th, 2007 by matslats