Like a Snake Biting
"Seconds before the earthquake, crows were making a lot of noise, but I didn't understand why. It was only after the quake that I learned the crows were warning us.""The moment the earthquake hit, it was like a snake biting from underground. It was the worst experience of my life. The walls were shaking and moving from side to side. It took about a minute before I could run out of the house." Morteza Javid, resident of Ahar, Iran
The crows were sounding their own alarm of fearful anticipation among themselves. Clever as they are, it is unlikely they had any intentions of making common cause with humans and providing a deliberate attempt to warn them of impending disaster. Animals have earned a reputation of knowing in advance through some manner of alert that a natural disaster like an earthquake is in the making.
It would appear that at least three hundred and six people died in the two earthquakes that occurred within eleven minutes of one another; the first hitting at 6.4 on the Richter scale, the following one 6.3, about 60 kilometres from the city of Tabriz, roughly 9.9 kilometres in depth. The epicentre said to have been between the towns of Ahar and Haris, about 600 kilometres from the capital, Tehran.
Five thousand people are said to have been wounded in the twin quakes, although it is anticipated that that number will grow. Since search for survivors and those buried in rubble was called off after 24 hours, there is much criticism of the government. Twenty villages were destroyed and over 130 others were heavily damaged. Some of the villages are isolated and difficult to get to, and it seems clear that rescue attempts were called off prematurely.
People were evacuated on stretchers, others treated for broken limbs and concussions, and families were sleeping on the ground in parks, lying on blankets, shivering in the cold mountainous atmosphere, near the border with Azerbaijan. Authorities have encouraged people to remain outdoors overnight with the risk of additional aftershocks continuing.
Countless tents have sprung up to shelter the homeless. Complaints are surfacing nonetheless about insufficient numbers of tents.
Iranian residents walk amongst the rubble of destroyed houses in the village of Amir-Ali KandiPhoto by ATTA KENARE/AFP/GettyImages
Many of the dead are women and children.
It has been reported that Iran has refused offers of aid from the United States, Germany, Turkey, Taiwan, Singapore and Russia. The Islamic Republic of Iran insists it has more than sufficient resources to recover from the quake without outside assistance. Lawmakers from the affected areas question that assertion. Members of parliament have complained about shortages of tents, and question the government's action in calling off rescue operations so precipitously.
The area is, in fact, in an earthquake-prone zone. Iran itself is
located on a fault zone, and experiences at least one earthquake daily,
although most are weak enough not to be noticed. The combination of
earthquake-prone geography and the co-location of nuclear facilities
represent a blueprint for a future disaster of unpredictable and unsurmountable
proportions.
It's unfortunate that Iran hasn't carefully studied Japan's catastrophic earthquake/tsunami/nuclear meltdown.
It's unfortunate that Iran hasn't carefully studied Japan's catastrophic earthquake/tsunami/nuclear meltdown.
Labels: Environment, Iran, Natural Disasters, Nature
posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, August 14, 2012
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