by Bayano Valy – SANF 06 No 21
Most Maputo and Beira residents were forced to share public places with street children and vagrants in the early hours of 23 February as they competed for a space to spend the night.
This is because some 20 minutes after midnight the tall buildings that decorate the landscape of both Maputo and Beira started swaying, causing dizziness and fainting in some people.
A minute or two later the streets were filled with barely clad people of all ages, still in a state of shock and unable to come to terms with what had just happened.
Slowly the news started filtering through via mobile phones’ short messaging services – someone had managed to get onto the Internet and found what had happened.
There had been an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.5 on the Richter scale, with its epicentre located 10 kilometres below the surface in Espungabera, in the district of Mossurize, in Mozambique’s western Manica province. The earthquake also hit Tete, Inhambane and Gaza.
There was some initial disbelief over the magnitude of the quake, because a 7.5 one is a disaster waiting to happen as seismological history is bound to witness.
Moments later Radio Mozambique and the private television station STV started warning people to stay outside until after five in the morning because of fears of an aftershock. During the course of the night there would be three mild aftershocks, which were hardly felt.
Through radio and television Mozambicans found out the quake had also been felt in neighbouring Zimbabwe and South Africa.
Government held an emergence meeting to assess the damage caused by the quake. The initial assessment put the death toll at one, 18 injuries, 26 houses either damaged or with cracks, and 13 cases of high blood pressure caused by stress.
Subsequent assessments put the death toll at four. Some of the people were injured as they tried jumping from the shaking buildings.
The country’s National Disaster Management Institute (INGC) has been charged with assessing all damages and come up with a Plan of Action in the next two weeks. This will entail providing for all those who lost properties and move people from quake-prone areas.
Part of southern Africa lies in the Great Rift Valley, an area prone to great seismological activity. From 1950 to 1957 there were 10 earthquakes, which recorded 6.0 on the Richter scale in the Rift Valley, and 4 in the Mozambique Channel.
In the last 25 years tremors were felt in Zimbabwe and Malawi. In terms of deaths, prior to the 23 February’s quake only Malawi had recorded the region’s worst casualties following a tremor measuring 5.8 on the Richter scale that claimed two lives in ….
So far it is not possible to predict earthquakes. Scientists have been racing against time to be able to predict, but this may not happen any time in the foreseeable future. However, it is possible to estimate the possibility of earthquakes based on historical data.
This can enable planners to prepare for the mitigation of earthquake hazards by helping improve the safety of building structures, and removing people from areas prone to disasters.
Regional countries’ plans for disaster preparedness has so far centred on early warning systems to cover food availability, access to food, information on staple food markets, as well as information on crop and livestock pests and diseases, and on flooding.
The 23 February quake is likely to drive regional countries to coordinate responses to tremors, and include such violent seismological activities in the list of phenomena likely to cause natural disasters.
Mozambique has, meanwhile, decided to build an observatory for seismology that can record and analyse data. Currently, there are four such observatories but information has to be sent to South Africa to be deciphered, which is not a wise arrangement as shown by the lack of prior warning prior to the 23 February quake.
With an observatory equipped to analyse data it is possible to have an inkling of how the tectonic plates are behaving and take necessary precautions.
This could also be an opportunity for the region to have a regional observatory that could give real time information to countries on the earth’s behaviour. This can be done as is shown by meteorologists who have already set up a mechanism to share information on weather patterns in southern Africa.
Surely this would give people enough time to leave houses decently clad.
