My heart is aching for the victims of the recent tragedy that hit Indonesia. The latest headline from CNN.com reads: "Indonesian disaster death toll tops 5,100, with 6,500 badly hurt"
Quoting CNN again:
The 6.3-magnitude quake, which struck close to the former Javanese royal capital of Yogyakarta, has so far killed 5,136 people, seriously wounded 6,504 and left 100,000 homeless, according to the country's Social Affairs Ministry. Another 2,081 suffered minor injuries.
This is just around a year and a half after the tsunami that hit the country together with other countries in Southeast Asia, India and even part of Africa.
Was browsing around the net trying to get more info on earthquakes when I found this wikipedia page about the Pacific Ring of Fire, map shown below
I quote:
The Ring of Fire is a zone of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions that encircles the basin of the Pacific Ocean. It is shaped like a horseshoe and it is 40,000 km long. It is associated with a nearly continuous series of oceanic trenches, island arcs, and volcanic mountain ranges and/or plate movements. It is sometimes called the circum-Pacific belt or the circum-Pacific seismic belt.
90% of the world's earthquakes and 81% of the world's largest earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire. The next most seismic region (5–6% of earthquakes and 17% of the world's largest earthquakes) is the Alpide belt which extends from Java to Sumatra through the Himalayas, the Mediterranean, and out into the Atlantic. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is the third most prominent earthquake belt.
The Philippines, including the most of Southeast Asia and Japan is inside this ring of fire. But knowing the Philippines, we do not really take preparation very seriously. I agree with what Alejandro R. Roces said in his article in Philippine Star today, to quote:
So far we have been lucky. Metro Manila has been spared of both typhoons and earthquakes. But it is only a matter of time before one or both disasters happen again. This time we should be ready. We can take the necessary measures to minimize the accompanying damage.
I hope as we send our own delegates to Indonesia to help them battle out this disaster, we do not forget the looming threat we have back home. We need to educate our people again to be prepared, to always make sure we are ready with what mother nature will throw our way. And lastly, I believe on the power of prayer, so that he will always protect us from natural calamities and disasters
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