Children were in schools and adults in their offices as in Ramazan office timings are changed. They start in early morning hours and close by the time of Zohar prayers.
The quake registered 7.6 on the Richter scale, making it one of the most powerful temblors ever to hit South Asia. The one in 2001, which struck Gujrat of India, killing over 20,000, had registered 7.7 and the Saturday's calamity was greater in magnitude than even the earthquake of 1935, which, devastated Quetta, killing nearly 60,000 people.
The USA Geological Survey observed that its epicenter was just north-east of Muzaffarabad in AJK's Neelam Valley and it is described by experts as "Shallow" ie its origin was close to the earth's surface and as such it was felt more intensely by those who experienced it.
The death and destruction shown on national and foreign TV channels on Saturday, especially the collapse of Margalla Towers in Islamabad, was just the tip of the iceberg. The death toll is still rising. The estimate of the government so far is 40,000 dead and about 68,000 injured.
What TV screens are reflecting, the devastation may end up in much higher figures. The worst affected area is Azad Kashmir where Muzaffarabad, Bagh and Balakot have the major sufferers. It is said that 70% of Azad Kashmir has been destroyed.
The most heartening thing is that our government has taken a leaf from the famous Edhi's book. The other surprising factor is that the people of Pakistan have swung into action on their own. Their spontaneous response to the suffering of fellow countrymen comes as a ray of hope in an otherwise dark scenario characterised by selfishness, greed and covetousness.
One can see relief centres and camps coming up in those parts, which are not affected by the quake. People are rushing with donations in cash and kind. In this gloomy scenario, where there is much to mourn, we can only hope that this new spirit of brotherhood and help seen around today will continue long after the international aid workers have gone home.
No doubt, earthquakes, floods and hurricanes have affected mankind since times immemorial, though their frequency and intensity have increased lately, thanks to human anti-ecological activities that have led to global warming. As such the UN's International Strategy for Disaster Reduction observes that "in 2003 about 254 million people suffered by natural calamities.
It was nearly three times of people suffered in 1990. About 83,000 were killed in 2003 as compared to 53,000 thirteen years ago."
Asia alone has faced a major earthquake practically every year since 2001:
Gujrat of India, Bam of Iran, the tsunami of South East Asia and Saturday's big temblor. If we cannot abort them, we can at least through our concerted efforts prevent colossal loss of life and property. The redeeming feature is that these tremors do not kill people, but it is collapsing of structures that lead to fatal casualties.
This fact is clearly evident in the ravaged Margalla Towers. It is reported in a leading daily that "senior officials of the Capital Development Authority had allowed unauthorised construction of one extra block of flats and had also overlooked the use of sub-standard building material."
The city of Karachi is also a victim of this corruption. Building control and monitoring authorities rarely if ever do their job properly and instead many of their officials tend to look the other way, quietly allowing developers and builders to indulge in all kinds of irregularities and illegalities. Besides, the quality of material that is used in constructing of high-rise buildings and blocks of flats for residential purposes is made of cement blocks and not of reinforced concrete cement [RCC].
If unfortunately a temblor of severe velocity strikes Karachi, it would not only cause immense damage to human life but also to property. The estimate of this writer is that 50 percent of high rise buildings and houses will be razed to the ground.
The possibility of occurrence of a severe earthquake is there because Karachi, the nation's largest city, too, is on a fault line. Therefore, the happening of such a catastrophe cannot be ruled out. Unfortunately, when it would occur, we will have a tragedy of unimaginable proportions. Are we prepared for such an eventuality? I think we are not.
The past record had been horrendous. There was a virtual collapse of whatever existed in the shape of a system of emergency handling when:
1) In 1987, two bombs blast occurred in Saddar area of Karachi around Empress Market and Bohri Bazar;
2) Bismillah Manzil in Lyari collapsed;
3) Fayyaz Plaza in Federal B Area fell;
4) Mushaidi Square at Shahrah-e-Faisal and two other projects including one of Maymar at Clifton came down tumbling to the ground;
5) The attempted hijacking of a PanAm plane was foiled by Commando action at Karachi Airport;
6) In the 1971 war, an oil fire at the port raged for almost seven days, as there were no chemicals and fire retardant to put out the fire.
When these medium-sized incidents occurred, casualties involved were not exceeding more than a couple of hundreds but even then chaotic scenes were seen in Jinnah Hospital where dead and injured were admitted. Very little co-ordination existed between doctors and para-medical staff. Acute shortage of medicines and life-saving drugs was keenly felt.
The entire burden of transporting the dead and the injured was borne by private and Edhi ambulances. The KMC and local administration had no clue. What would have been the tragedy if the number of dead and the injured had been in thousands as it happened in recent earthquake?
These above mishaps loudly speak that the Karachi city of over 12 million people is not adequately equipped to deal with such emergencies.
WHAT IT NEEDS IS:
a) To make buildings earth-quake proof and resistant;
b) Rescue operations should be speedy and sufficient;
c) Efforts of the local administration and federal government be co-ordinated;
d) Most urgently required is the Disaster Management Agency on the pattern of USA's Federal Emergency Management Agency [FEMA]. It should be set up to deal with such calamities so that the country may not be caught unawares in case of any disaster. Its formation should be expedited and a strategy be worked out as a matter of urgency;
e) Fire Brigade Department should be updated and modernised, as at present it is obsolete. It, at present, has very insufficient fire tenders, fire stations, ambulances and only one snorkel.
According to international rules, there should have been one fire station, with four tenders for every one hundred thousand persons and for the present population of Karachi, there should have been at least 110 fire stations [now 10] and 440 fire tenders [30 only].
Two ambulances and one snorkel should be at each fire station. [Now total 3 ambulances and one snorkel]. Therefore, the duty of new elected Nazim should be to equip the system of fire fighting on a high priority. Without adequate fire stations and its appendage all rescue efforts in an emergency would be futile.
If the city Nazim feels that he is confronted with short of funds for modernising the system of fire fighting, then I suggest that he should approach personally all financial institutions, like banks, leasing companies, modarbahs, insurers, mutual fund companies, Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Trade, Karachi Stock Exchange to donate not cash but fire tenders, ambulances, snorkels, suction and jetting machines, gas detectors, fire extinguishing suits for fire-men, turn table ladders, snake-eye video camera, thermal imaging camera, super compact mobile power pack, telescopic spreader, high performance telescopic rams, lifters having a capacity of 24 to 59 tons, jack ram for lifting up beams of 30 tons and having capacity of up to 59 inches, hydraulic premium cutter, excavator with tyre and twin capacity hammer, excavator with chain [crawler] and such like other equipment.
It is, therefore, high time that we should learn a lesson from the recent earthquake and start revamping the existing obsolete and deteriorating fire-fighting set up, which is a first step towards strengthening the emergency system.
The Civil Defence Organisation, [CDO] which used to play a prominent role in such eventualities, has been the victim of negligence for the last three decades; and thus, its performance has become almost redundant. Its strength of registered volunteers is now just 500 for a city of over 12 million population.
Therefore, it is the duty of the CDGK that it should reorganise the CDO on modern lines so that CDO may co-ordinate with fire Brigade Department and Karachi Building Control Authority and in this way, remove the causes that may generate the miseries for the people of Karachi in the event of earthquakes, bomb blasts and oil-spill at sea beaches and floods.
Now as such a survey may be conducted by the above agencies in respect of those buildings which are vulnerable to tremors so that some remedial measures may be taken to strengthen the weak portions of these vulnerable buildings.
Last but not the least when the recent quake struck, there was no civil defence infrastructure. The only people performing search and rescue operations were the ordinary people.
They had no sniffing dogs, snake-eye cameras and vibraphone sound which the team of Rapid UK brought to save the people trapped under the collapsed buildings. If we had the Rapid Pak on the pattern of Rapid UK, we could have saved almost all persons trapped beneath the twisted rubble of fallen schools, hospitals and homes.
This Rapid Pak would have been established after the December 1974 devastating earthquake in Kohistan district, which wiped out thousands of villages and killed thousands of people. But we failed to do so. We know that such an organisation require substantial finances but we should not be deterred by these handicaps because when the protection of our VIPs come, we do not hesitate to expend in the latest bullet-proof cars and high-tech jamming devices. Therefore, the same keenness should be applied in disaster preparedness in order to safeguard our countrymen.
The earthquake of the 8th October is the wake-up call for our federal and provincial governments to prepare themselves better on the country-basis for the next disaster.
On l2th October, as reported in a leading newspaper, the National Security Council met under the chairmanship of President Pervez Musharraf, have decided to set up a 'National Disaster Management Agency' [NDMA] under the direct supervision of the Prime Minister. It is hoped that this much needed proposal would materialise very soon, as it is the dire need of the country for quite sometime. I am afraid, it would not be swept under the carpet as normally is being done by our governments when the urgency disappears.