EDITORIAL - Stronger than the Big One

Remember earthquakes? They are a constant and unpredictable threat to countries like the Philippines that sit within the Pacific Ring of Fire.

There’s a standing warning about the so-called Big One that could hit Metro Manila and neighboring areas anytime, with up to 50,000 people projected to die and over 100,000 injured from collapsing structures and fires.

The Big One is projected at Magnitude 7.2 or higher. The quake that struck General Santos City, Sarangani and several other parts of Mindanao yesterday was recorded at Magnitude 7.8 – as powerful as the one that devastated Luzon on July 16, 1990, which left over 1,600 people dead.

Seismologists have been warning about the Big One, to be generated by the movement of the 100-kilometer-long West Valley Fault, since an Earthquake Impact Reduction Study was released in March 2004 by the Japan International Cooperation Agency and the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology.

Since then, earthquake drills have been carried out regularly in schools and workplaces nationwide. New technology is being applied in the construction of buildings and public infrastructure to make them earthquake-resilient. But too many other structures, especially the older ones, as well as government projects tainted with corruption are at high risk of destruction in an earthquake.

Even new projects can lack structural integrity. Bodies continue to be pulled from the rubble of a nine-story building in Angeles City, Pampanga that collapsed last May 24 before construction was completed.

In February last year, the brand-new Cabagan-Santa Maria bridge in Isabela province, already twice retrofitted even before being used, crumpled during its soft opening. In October, the Piggatan Bridge in Alcala, Cagayan also collapsed as several trucks transporting agricultural products were passing through.

With the nation distracted by vicious political warfare and the unprecedented scale of corruption in public works and the national budget, earthquake resilience is pushed down the totem pole of priorities.

The disaster in Mindanao, with the death toll at 31 as of Monday night, should remind everyone that earthquakes can strike anytime, anywhere, and it’s never too early to be fully prepared.