Could a tsunami strike on Makran coast affect Karachi?

[Naveed Yaseen]

By Amar Guriro
KARACHI: Jakarta Tsunami Information Centre Programme Officer and the Liaison Officer for the Disaster Risk Reduction Team, Ardito M Kodijat, warned on Monday that a major tsunami on the Makran coast could also affect Karachi.

He said the Makran coast was struck by a major tsunami in the past and it is vulnerable to another one in the future, and in such a case, the calamity can also strike Karachi in no time.

“The coast of Makran is vulnerable to a possible tsunami as it is located on the joint of the Eurasian Plate and the Arabian Plate and a tsunami hit the coastal belt of Makran in 1945 that brought mass destruction to the these areas. I can’t explain exactly where and when would the next tsunami strike and what would be its intensity, but if a major tsunami hits the Makran coast, it would also reach Karachi,” said Kodijat.

Addressing a two-day Unesco-PMD training workshop of media persons on tsunami warning dissemination through the media, arranged by the Pakistan Meteorological Department in collaboration with Unesco, and later talking to this scribe, Kodijat said there is no need to panic over such a threat, but we need to make communities aware as to how to cope with a possible tsunami.

However, renowned expert of geophysics, former director general of the Pakistan Metrological Department and Sir Syed University of Karachi Department of Geophysics Chairman Syed Amir Ahmed Kazmi rejected any possibility of a tsunami hitting Karachi.

“Karachi has never remained in the tsunami zone in the past, but sometimes some areas of the city such as Defence and Clifton are shaken with jolts, but this is not due to earthquakes, but the illegal land filling to extend land over the sea following which the soft debris that used results in the jolts,” he said.

He said there are remote chances of a tsunami occurring in the North Arabian Sea. “But any minor tsunami could occur in the Arabian Sea and to detect that I had suggested that a tsunami early warning centre should be established,” Kazmi said.

In 1819, a tsunami hit Keti Bunder and Shah Bandar ports of Sindh and in 1945 a major tsunami smashed Pasni and Ormara towns of the Makran coast, which killed almost the entire population.

A tsunami usually brings tides around nine metres high that hit the coast with a speed of about 600 miles to 750 miles per hour, depending on the magnitude of the earthquake that caused it.

Talking about the history of tsunami, Kazmi said that before the atomic explosion in the Japanese city of Hiroshima, the world always assumed that high tides in the sea caused a tsunami, but following the Hiroshima nuclear explosion, an earthquake occurred resulting in a tsunami. This resolved the mystery of what causes a tsunami.

“After the World War II, the world came to know the importance of geophysics and experts of this field rushed to different countries...two of them arrived in Pakistan to establish the subject of geophysics at the university level,” he said.

Kazmi further said that during the years of a martial law in Pakistan, science has always been ignored and those professors and experts who went abroad were always called back. “The same happened to me when I was abroad for studies...I was called back at that time and I returned even though several professors preferred staying there,” he said.

Chief Meteorologist Muhammad Riaz said the Makran coast has witnessed six minor earthquakes in the last eight months, out of which one measured above 5.0 on the Richter scale. “In any case of a tsunami emergency, the operators at the tsunami early warning centre can inform the officials of the Pakistan Disaster Management Authority, the media and the departments concerned within 15 minutes through a short message service, fax and a telephone call,” he said.

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...009_pg12_7