Disaster area

Living within the so-called Ring of Fire, the average Filipino is used to earthquakes. When the walls start shaking, I just sit still and wait for the tremor to end.

What was striking in the Magnitude 6.9 earthquake that struck Negros and neighboring areas the other day was the widespread panic triggered by a tsunami warning in Cebu City. That was a first in this country, as far as I can recall. There was similar panic when Mt. Pinatubo erupted, but by that time the eruption was already under way. Fortunately for Cebu, the tsunami never hit.

The common immediate reaction in Cebu was just as striking: people headed for higher ground. Obviously people saw what happened during the devastating tsunami last year in Japan, which swept away tens of thousands of people and almost everything in its path. The few survivors were plucked by rescuers mostly from the rooftops of tall buildings.

While the instinctive response to seek higher ground was correct, it clearly could use some fine-tuning. The experience of Cebu could serve as a lesson for the rest of the country in preparing for a tsunami.

Local governments can start drawing up plans for an orderly (even if hurried) move to higher ground, for both vehicles and pedestrians. Reports reaching us from Cebu said residents initially tried to drive to nearby slopes, but traffic quickly ground to a halt so vehicles were simply abandoned in the streets.

With a series of mild tremors fueling the panic, people rushed to the top floors of buildings and footbridges – structures that are vulnerable to a strong quake, but you can’t worry about two potential disasters at the same time. The warning was for a major tsunami, not a powerful quake.

Local authorities can also prepare contingency plans to quickly counter malicious rumors spread through social media and by text. Government volcanologists issued a “Level 2” tsunami alert for minor changes in sea level after the earthquake struck. But text messages warned that the tsunami could be worse. When people in coastal communities noticed the sea level rising, the mad rush started.

It’s still better to panic and be safe than to ignore warnings and get in harm’s way. But people, especially children and the infirm, could be injured in a disorderly rush to safety.

Evacuation facilities on higher ground can also be readied, with decent sanitation and access at least to clean water.

This is for a tsunami, where an early warning is possible. Earthquakes are of course a different matter.

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Predicting earthquakes is still largely guesswork, even in industrialized countries such as Japan. No one can be fully prepared for an earthquake, especially one that causes liquefaction, when the ground seems to swallow up entire buildings. But it’s possible to minimize the impact.

In August 1968, an Intensity 7 quake shook the city of Manila. The worst hit was the Ruby Tower apartment building at the corner of Doroteo Jose and T. Alonzo streets in Sta. Cruz, Manila. Of some 600 tenants in the six-story building, 342 died.

That tragedy prompted several property developers to find methods of reducing the vulnerability of buildings to collapse during a strong earthquake.

Not all property developers did this. And the country is still full of structures that cannot withstand a powerful quake. Metro Manila, especially the old sections, is dotted with these structures. In 2004, a building collapsed in Divisoria, in the city of Manila. The disaster was blamed on indiscriminate diggings in nearby property development projects. But a structure with strong foundations should have been able to withstand such diggings.

Houses built on slopes, such as those in Baguio City, are obviously also vulnerable. Baguio should have learned its lesson from the Magnitude 7.8 earthquake that struck Luzon on July 16, 1990. The city was among the worst hit in the quake that killed at least 1,621 people. But the city has failed to prevent its slopes from being taken over by informal settlers, whose shanties are built precariously over deep ravines.

As of yesterday afternoon, volcanologists had recorded some 900 aftershocks on Negros Island. Up to 100 people were feared buried in rubble and landslides.

There was no new tsunami warning in Cebu or neighboring areas. But with wild weather being experienced across the planet, disaster mitigation authorities should not rule out the possibility that our archipelago, with its 7,100 islands, could experience a strong tsunami – even one as catastrophic as the wall of water that slammed northeastern Japan last year, or the one in 2004 that devastated parts of Indonesia, the Maldives, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

In Asia, the Philippines was listed at the top of countries worst hit by disasters in 2011, according to the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters. Estimates of annual economic losses due to typhoons, floods, earthquakes and other natural disasters in this country are placed at P15 billion.

The human toll is just as devastating. Last year’s 33 disasters in the Philippines claimed 1,430 lives. Margareta Wahlstrom, special representative of the United Nations Secretary General for Disaster Risk Reduction, said during a visit in Manila late last month that the UN would urge the Philippine government to give priority to disaster risk reduction.

After the latest earthquake, the government should need no prodding from the UN.