KARACHI: There is just no coming to grips with the tragedy. After concerted relief efforts by almost every citizen for two weeks (and continuing), all that is left is remorse because we couldn’t do enough; anger at those who could but didn’t; and profound grief at the huge number of deaths.
For all those directly in the fray, life will never be the same. The image of the child stuck under the debris who breathed his last, will always remain. The voices from under the wreckage and the helpless wait for aid which was late will haunt forever. Each victim, who lost an arm, a leg or an eye, will eternally be reminded of the time when the quake struck.
There is too much sorrow to cope with and Karachi, as someone mentioned, is the city truly in mourning. The migrant work force in this city coming in from the northern areas and Punjab to earn a living have each lost some member from his immediate or extended family. A local journalist lost close to 30 people from his extended family. Such incidents simply become statistics as the grief cannot be gauged and the sorrow numbs the senses and is overtaken by even more statistics of doom and devastation. But individuals are reacting in different ways.
In Karachi, while the relief efforts persist and droves of volunteers continue to move back and forth from the disaster areas, the fear factor – spurned by the 800 or so aftershocks felt in the calamity hit regions and the mild intensity one felt in Kalaat and Karachi – has instilled the morbid notion that we have reached doomsday. Rumours predicting a massive jolt in Karachi were so strong last week that people had given a specific date for the earthquake to hit Karachi and the ensuing devastation.
Incidentally, rumours of cyclones and hurricanes predicting to sweep away Karachi’s coastline were rife even before the earthquake tragedy. In fact, these have been an annual panic feature in Karachi since the past two decades. The first time such a rumour spread in 1983, almost the entire Defence and Clifton area was vacated and there was a traffic jam on the route to Hyderabad.
While there is no harm in following precautions, it is better to be informed about the weather implications and to be prepared in a practical way rather than to create panic which might cause more harm eventually.
Astronomy experts say that earthquakes and hurricanes can never be predicted in advance. A close monitoring of the weather through the barometer indications can be carried out which may warn of high tide and stormy winds in case of a hurricane but that too only about 48 hours or so in advance. Similarly seismic activity has to be very closely monitored for any earthquake warning, and in most cases there is seldom any warning time.
Whereas cyclones – which have so often been predicted for Karachi – follow a set weather pattern and appear climatically. Captain Karim, astronomy expert and one time head of port operations at KPT says, “In our part of the world, cyclones spawn in the Arabian Sea, generally off the coast of western India during south-west monsoon season (i.e. between the months of May and September). It is a seasonal phenomenon associated with the formation of low atmospheric pressure over the Arabian Sea.”
He explains that cyclones follow a yearly route veering a few hundred miles at the most. “The general route they take is North-eastern and head towards the coast of India. Sometimes they may veer northwards before hitting the coast and some times they may venture well inland. Their trend is that after crossing the coastline of Maharashtra they move northwards and after passing Gujrat they change direction and head in a north-westerly direction towards the sea, bypassing Karachi by about 100 to 150 miles. Some coastal areas of Pakistan to the south like Badin may sometimes be affected, being on the periphery of the cyclonic route but it is a very rare occasion when a cyclone has hit Karachi fairly and squarely. Over the past 70 years, I do not recall more than one occasion when a cyclone has directly passed over Karachi.”
While the cyclone might not be a real threat to Karachi, the fear of the earthquake has become too tangible to dismiss as mere hysteria. And while on the individual level, people are gearing themselves for an emergency plan like maintaining an emergency kit and circulating advisories on the internet on how to save oneself in case of collapsing buildings, the response plan on the city level – which is absent – must be outlined.
Most importantly, children must be put through a drill and prepared in schools on how to save themselves and where to congregate in case of a catastrophe. At this point, counselling children regarding the tragedy of the quake must be undertaken by teachers as these little minds are passing through their own trauma. There are children in Karachi who have lost their relatives to the earthquake and with that loss the images of devastation and the tales of gore and death have shaken up many of them.
With the earthquake taking such a heavy toll of the nation, it is only natural that people would become panicky at any rumour and that is the case these days. A plea to the meteorological department is to spruce up their act and equip themselves with modern machinery, which would at least enable public to take basic precautions. There is no saying when a natural calamity may strike and if it does, there is nowhere to run either. But with a forewarning and adequate infrastructure one would at least not be left feeling that things could have been different and many more lives might have been saved.
