DHAKA: No one knows when it may strike. No one knows what to do when it does. But one thing all Bangladeshis seem to know is that a giant “python” is waking up and twirling under the earth.
People here fear a major earthquake is brewing, like those which over the years have killed thousands of people in neighbouring India and Nepal.
Bangladeshis have learned to live with the devastating storms and floods which batter their country almost every year, but have never suffered a catastrophic quake. Now concern is growing after a series of tremors, one measuring just over five on the Richter scale, jolted southeastern Bangladesh.
No lives were lost but the tremors, coming in quick succession, convinced people in the country’s most vulnerable southeastern region that they had better brace for a “big one”.
Worst hit by recent tremors was Barkal, a remote, sparsely populated hill township where more than a dozen people were injured, many buildings cracked and some hills caved in.
“If the 5.09 intensity tremor had struck densely populated cities, the impacts could be disastrous,” said Sirajul Islam, deputy director of the government’s geological survey department.
If the intensity exceeded six, it could be dangerous for the country’s Kaptai hydraulic power project, other experts said.
Could Bangladesh handle a big earthquake? No one knows.
Local residents liken a tremor to a python awaking from slumber.
The southeastern region was rattled five more times in the following week, forcing many residents to flee their homes and those staying on to sleep in the open.
POOR READINESS: The country seems woefully unprepared to handle an earthquake emergency. Its lone geophysical observatory in Chittagong can just about confirm that a quake has occurred but nothing more.
The government has yet to allocate the 250 million taka ($4.3 million) needed to upgrade the decades-old observatory and build the three new ones experts say are needed to record full details of a tremor and assess its impact.
Successive governments have sat on the plan, despite the near certainty that a quake measuring seven or more on the Richter scale would level hundreds of buildings in Chittagong and the capital, Dhaka.
Also it might well destroy key infrastructure, severing road and rail links vital to rush aid to victims, meteorology and disaster management officials said.
State news agency BSS said Disaster and Relief Minister Chowdhury Kamal Ibne Yusuf told a Japanese visitor on Tuesday: “As we don’t have adequate knowledge and advanced technologies, any big shock may put the entire nation into big trouble.”
Why is Bangladesh unprepared for the “big one”.
Early in August Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia asked government departments to speed up the process of setting up new observatories and to raise a thousands-strong volunteer corps to help in a quake aftermath.
She said the civil service, army, police, paramilitary troops and firefighters must be ready to respond to emergency calls and undertake immediate rescue and relief operations.
Khaleda urged Dhaka city authorities to check if recently erected buildings had breached designs or flouted approved models.
AWARENESS CAMPAIGN: State-run television and radio are airing special programmes to alert people about quakes and tell what to do if one strikes.
But how long it would take to put a contingency safety plan in place is unclear.
“We must build up capability to rescue and get help to affected people in case of a massive earthquake, although it cannot be predicted,” Akram Hossain, director of the Bangladesh Meteorological Department, said.
Professor Jahangir Hossain, coordinator of the Earthquake Research Centre at the Chittagong Engineering University, said “frequent small-intensity quakes are an omen for a greater disaster”.
He said that Dhaka and Chittagong, the country’s biggest cities, would be worst affected because of their large population, old buildings and poorly designed high-rise living and office complexes.
Seismologists said mild tremors hit Bangladesh 40 times in 2002 and 18 times so far this year. Bounded by India and Myanmar on three sides and the Bay of Bengal to the south, and within 1,000 kms of the Himalayas, Bangladesh is a quake-prone country, meteorologists said.—Reuters
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