Earthquake / Tsunami hits Asia

I jeard about that ont he radio when it had just happened. I was shocked at the magnitude of it! I hope they don't have anymore aftershocks.

i hope all our CPF members in the area make it thru okay.

is this quote from the Yahoo/MSN article i read really true?
[ QUOTE ]
"All the planet is vibrating" from the quake, said Enzo Boschi, the head of Italy's National Geophysics Institute. Speaking on SKY TG24 TV, Boschi said the quake even disturbed the Earth's rotation.

[/ QUOTE ]

8.9 or greater magnitude quakes don't happen too often. IIRC, the last quakes in comparable magnitude was a 9.2 in Alaska in the early 60s, and a 9.5 in Chile in the early to mid 60s.

I just heard about the news this evening (happened in the morning in M'sia). Apparently it wasn't that bad for the M'sian side, there were some tremors felt, and I met a couple just now who said they'd woken up to a shaking building (hotel) this morning on the island on Penang. Watching the news just now reports that at least a couple thousand ppl were missing or dead. Hardest hit was India I think, imagine the magnitude of it (8.9) that we could feel it all the way here!! Goes to show again that you never know what could hit you when and where...

Shiftd, I hope you and your relatives are okay.

I just heard on the news that the magnitude of the earthquake was 9.0, and the death toll stands at approximately 10,000.

My nephew was / is(?) in Thailand on a holiday. We got word this afternoon that he left the island resort for the mainland a day before the waves hit. He is supposed to be in the air on his way home now. I don't know if the flight schedules are interupted.

I hope all is well with our CPF members and their families.

Singapore's ok here.

With natural disasters of this magnitude, it is surely a shame that mankind can't take its defense budget for guarding against, and relief in aftermath, of damage inflicted by nature instead of funneling so much of our resources into defense against eachother. My heart goes out to all of those who lost terra firma and have had their lives significantly altered by loss. For so many the cycle of life has abruptly ended!

I selfishly hope our CPF community has not been effected by this disaster but to be certain, a disaster it is!

Terrible, terrible tragedy!! My thoughts & prayers certainly going out to those affected by this disaster.

somebody set off a big one eh? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/eek.gif

i knew we have quite a few cpfers from that area, hope everyone is ok...

just look at these siezmographs...
graphs (as of 10:30 central time, most of them look black)

I am okay here too.
Stanley, chamenos sent his regards, he was worried about you.

Fortunately, my friends in Penang are okay too. Some others on the island were not so fortunate /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif Many drowned due to the tidal wave that hit the coast.

And yet what was I reading earlier but that building a warning system to help let people know they should head inland is not worth the cost because these things happen so rarely.

would have paid for itself today though wouldn't it.

you've got anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours between when the earthquake happens when the waves hit. More than enough time to drastically reduce the loss of life. But there was nothing in place to warn anybody about anything, even though they knew it was coming.

Course, thats just whats getting printed right now, I have no idea whats true or not about it.

I'm really glad to see our CPFers in the affected area reporting in that they are okay. As members of one big family, we are always concerned for health and welfare of fellow CPFers, when disaster strikes.

SJACKAL and nexro, glad you are okay, and thank you for reporting in that all is well in your area.

I encourage any other CPFers in the affected are to report in if they are able.

KevinL, haven't heard from you yet. Let us know you are okay if you can.

Jim and others, many thanks for your concern. Everything's normal here. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

James, that sounds like the typical mentality of so many people "why bother, it's expensive" until the big one hits and they have incoming and realize that yes, the initial outlay would have been a pittance compared to the losses sustained by not having it. But there is always hope that things will change and that the next time, there will be warning.

The USA could divert a few tens of billions from the latest "Star Wars" attempt, which in order to work may bankrupt us. Hey, being several trillions in debt, are we already bankrupt?

that is a horrifying story.

my heart goes out to those people.

wow...i just heard that the death toll is 24,000.

Bob

jayflash /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif what has that got to do with it? And the pentagon budget for that program is only 10 billion a year if i remember correctly. So it's hardly a few tens of billions sitting around waiting to be redirected to other things, and I don't think that it would be easy or legal for them to just re-distribute it as foreign aid anyway...

the media has certainly decided that a missile defense system will never work, but media coverage of science is never based on science anyway. just like political support of science is never based on science either /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif The media coverage of the last abortive test of the system was so remarkably misinformed that I had to read it several times to see if they were reporting on what I thought they were reporting on. You need to read more than reuters news feeds /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Has anyone seen Shiftd ?

I THINK he might have been on vacation, and MIGHT have been around one of these areas.