In Nature’s Maw
Imagine living in Haiti in a tent up to your ankles in mud and snakes, and you hear about this 8.8 earthquake in Chile. That got you beat by a bunch. You got just a seven, which in Richter terms was 500 times less severe than what hit Chile. And then you hear that they were reporting 700 dead (at this writing), and though there will be more bodies found in the rubble, the death toll will never approach the more than the 230,000 fatalities in Haiti.
One of the reasons was that the quake struck in the ocean off Chile as opposed to a couple of miles from the capital in Haiti. Also, the Chilean quake was an upward-thrusting event unlike the lateral motion Haiti experienced. And then there was the fact that building codes were more rigorous in Chile than in Haiti.
Tsunami alarms were out to virtually every country in the Pacific Basin. Where I make my daily perambulation, a red "Danger!" tape had been stretched across the entrance to a small footbridge that leads to the beach. Most everyone, of course, obeyed the tape; I, of course, stepped across it. Few people were out, even though the storm clouds had broken and the area was bathed in delicious sunlight.
I came upon a Deputy Sheriff (Angus Wilhite) driving the coast warning people of the danger. I flashed my press card, chatted briefly about the uncertainty of tsunami forecasting, and continued my sun-warmed sojourn on one of the most glorious days of the new year. Well, at least here on the Monterey Coast...6,000 miles from the Chile.
If the vast majority of scientists who have warned about the impending dangers of global warming and climate change – our current unmentionables – are correct in their assessment, then it gives one extra pause when Nature ravages. Will we look back in a decade, more or less, in the midst of hellish new weather and wonder if we hadn’t received some warnings?
©2010 SetonnoteS
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