Spreading The Word of Tsunami Relief

[Guest guest]

[NOTE: Relief organizations noted below are linked from the cited

article; just at end of post. Thanks - DB]

 

December 27, 2004: Relief groups such as the American Red Cross were

providing information Monday about how to donate aid, as the world

community responded to coastal nations in Southeast Asia that were

devastated by a massive underwater earthquake and tsunami Sunday.

 

Bloggers also picked up the links and ran with them, quickly

spreading information about the magnitude of the situation, which

has devastated Sri Lanka, coastal regions of India and Thailand and

beyond.

 

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake registered 9.0 on the

Richter scale when it hit Sunday. It triggered a massive tsunami,

including walls of waves some 33-feet high, that overwhelmed many

coastal communities throughout Southeast Asia. By Monday, the

International Red Cross had estimate some 23,000 lives were lost,

and had issued alerts about the spread of disease from the deaths.

 

News reports said more than half the deaths so far were in Sri

Lanka, but major outages and damages also hit India's Andaman and

Nicobar islands, as well as Malaysia, Bangladesh, and as far away as

Somalia.

 

A group of Indian bloggers launched a community blog called The

South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami, where they were sharing

information about how to lend a hand.

 

The site included an appeal from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan

Singh who asked for donations through the office's National Relief

Fund. In a statement posted on the blog, he said thousands of people

have lost their lives and property worth scores of rupees has been

damaged. He appealed to all citizens to donate generously.

 

Relief organization Oxfam posted information on its Web site on how

to donate, especially for Sri Lankans. Oxfam said Sri Lanka is one

of the worst affected countries by the floods. According to initial

estimates, 5,000 people may have been killed, 200,000 directly

affected and perhaps one million made homeless.

 

"This is a massive humanitarian disaster, and communications are so

bad we still don't know the full scale of it. Unless we get aid

quickly to the people, many more could die," said Phil Esmonde, head

of Oxfam in Sri Lanka, in a statement.

 

Other bloggers who normally don't write about general news suspended

their focus to include posts from people who witnessed the

devastation, such as this post from a blog called Worldchanging.com,

which carried an account of the earthquake's effects in India in the

Indian Express.

 

Software company FogCreek said it would donate half its revenues

this week to the disaster.

 

Other bloggers just urged their colleagues to spread the word. "Stop

surfing and do something -- now," wrote blogger Greg Hughes, who

provided links and information at his Command Post.

 

Another tech blogger, Nick Bradbury, wrote that he would donate what

he earns from TopStyle and FeedDemon to the International Red Cross

relief efforts.

 

According to the United States Geological Survey, a tsunami is a sea

wave of local or distant origin that results from large-scale

seafloor displacements associated with large earthquakes, major

submarine slides or exploding volcanic islands.

 

The earthquake struck off the west coast of Northern Sumatra on

Sunday, Dec. 26, the USGS's site said. It was located about 160

miles southeast of Sumatra, Indonesia.

 

The impacted nations include Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand,

Malaysia, Somalia and Bangladesh. The survey site also said tsunamis

occurred on the coasts of Maldives and Cocos Island and were felt

widely in Sumatra.

 

The quake and its after-effects now rank as the fourth largest in

the world since 1900.

 

Scientists told the Associated Press and Reuters that the

catastrophic death toll could have been avoided by use of an early

warning system that could have warned coastal residents to evacuate

the area.

 

Source: InternetNews.com; copyright 2004 Jupitermedia Corporation

. By Erin Joyce. Jim Wagner contributed reporting

to this article.

URL: http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3452111