Natural Disaster: another 22,000+ dead

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Myanmar is hit with another cyclone that killed at least 22,000 ppl.

I wondered why are we, all nations and human beings as a whole, still not spending our real effort in preventing things like these such as early detections, relieve infrastructures, architecture structure reform, concerted multi national co-operations in these stuff, may be also global warming if data warrants their effects?

While I see Rice is hot headed for the Peace Talk in Middle East (not to say I don't think peace in Middle East is not important), we are loosing lots of rice in Asia!

 

[Deanos]

I wondered why are we, all nations and human beings as a whole, still not spending our real effort in preventing things like these such as early detections, relieve infrastructures, architecture structure reform, concerted multi national co-operations in these stuff, may be also global warming if data warrants their effects?

This news report excerpt may explain it:

The country's ruling junta, which has spurned the international community for decades, urgently appealed for foreign aid at a meeting Nyan Win held with diplomats Monday in Yangon.
The U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator said Tuesday the government had indicated it was ready to start accepting international aid. The U.N., Red Cross and other aid organizations have been organizing supplies in preparation for shipping them to the country.

 

[jhale]

Burma / Myanmar has been devastated by years of corrupt dictatorship. It's horrible what has happened there. they have all the resources to be a great place to live, but the ruling family has stolen and sold off everything. Your either poor or work for the government / military.

I had the chance to meet the entire ousted government, and I know those who have been trying for years to help burma from the outside. I hope this tragedy allows the UN to get in and do something positive, there has been little to hope for in that country for a long time.

 

[inkblue]

god bless their souls

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

That's kind of thing I wanna discuss. Why most rulers(dictator or not) tends to concern themselves with military rather human aids? Most rulers tends to talk about missile defense or attack abilities rather than natural disaster prevention or relieve capabilities.

Burma / Myanmar has been devastated by years of corrupt dictatorship. It's horrible what has happened there. they have all the resources to be a great place to live, but the ruling family has stolen and sold off everything. Your either poor or work for the government / military.

I had the chance to meet the entire ousted government, and I know those who have been trying for years to help burma from the outside. I hope this tragedy allows the UN to get in and do something positive, there has been little to hope for in that country for a long time.

 

[Chiefmcfuz]

Wingo there is one reason and one reason only. One makes you money one costs you lots of money

 

[Deanos]

I don't know about "most" rulers, but many dictators assume power through military means. It stands to reason that they would showoff their military abilities to discourage a similar attack on their position of power.

 

[jhale]

Burma's rulers have been allowed to do whatever they wanted for the past 4 decades. There has been no intervention from the rest of the world. If you want to discuss anything that's what I'd talk about. they rule by force and intimidation.
These are not rulers who were appointed by the people, there is no incentive for them to take care of their own people. It's not like they are going to be voted out of office.
well technically they were voted out in 1990, but they decided they did not want to leave so they just put their political opponents in jail. with a mentality like that how would anything positive get accomplished?

 

[inkblue]

how is tHat any different from any other country... have we forGotten New Orleans?

 

[jhale]

new orleans?? how does new orleans compare to 40 years of military rule

 

[inkblue]

:lol2: miLitary ruLe onLy suckS if u dont know anyone...

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Burma's rulers have been allowed to do whatever they wanted for the past 4 decades. There has been no intervention from the rest of the world. If you want to discuss anything that's what I'd talk about. they rule by force and intimidation.
These are not rulers who were appointed by the people, there is no incentive for them to take care of their own people. It's not like they are going to be voted out of office.
well technically they were voted out in 1990, but they decided they did not want to leave so they just put their political opponents in jail. with a mentality like that how would anything positive get accomplished?

I agreed to your point about rulers in Burma that they basically took the office by force and that it's unlikely positive cooperation would come out o it.

However, it does not require "rulers who were not appointed by the people" to forget about general citizen concerns.

This Burma thing is only the tip of an iceburg-we have major tsunamis, earth quakes all around Asia, India, Thailand, China, Japan and even America... all these still have not awakened governments of the world. It is not a democracy issue-it's not dictatorship issue-it's lack of feelings for our own kind-life of human beings as a whole. We have military enemies that hack each other's head off while we also policeman shooting our own citizens in unnecessary violence. Rulers wage wars against enemies(be it just or not) and followers/supporters forget about how many would die due to ANY war either because of direct hit or indirect hit such as poor sanitation, crumbling medical system, failing economy or such. We let natural disaster continuously to strike us worse than most bombs(nukes excluded) yet, we(general public) still do not stand up and tell all our governments(all the world) to do something. It's our lack of concern for our own lives that spurred the wrong direction of our governments too.

I feel terrible whenever I see or hear about how many people die in the war or a natural disaster. Wars are willfully made by men while natural disasters are not. We should raise the awareness of the harmful effects of natural disaster and concentrate our efforts to defeat this enemy.

 

[jhale]

Wingo I understand what your saying, however it's hard to defeat an earthquake.

Ink, that is very true, better to know those in power if your going to survive in a military run country.

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

:lol2: miLitary ruLe onLy suckS if u dont know anyone...

:tongue1::shhh:

 

[inkblue]

yup, itS a sad reaLity living in a military-dominant soCiety... that's why i LOOOVE the phiLippines!

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

So true. Just wish buyers are more into buying Medical Ship rather than an aircraft carrier.

Wingo there is one reason and one reason only. One makes you money one costs you lots of money

 

[fritz]

It's hard for most governments to invest the money in something like that. For example, suppose we invest $100 million dollars into tsunami detection technology. The Hurricane detection people will scream and holler. The earthquake people will scream and holler, the homeless advocates will scream and holler, everyone looking for money will complain.

Next November someone will say "Wingo voted to send $100 million dollars overseas rather than feed starving children right here in NY" Another person will say "Wingo voted to spend $100 million dollars overseas which could have been used to *something REALLY good*" etc etc etc

You'll be voted out

Also supposing your $100 million actually finds a technology that can detect a tsunami instantly anywhere in the world. What good does it do? How do you tell everyone? What are they supposed to do?

If I were to tell you that in 20 minutes some state in the US would be hit by a 200 foot tall wave what could we do about it? You could tell them. Quite possibly more people would die in the next 20 minutes of panic, trampling etc than would be killed by the wave. Roads and highways would choke instantly and people would be trapped. It would be horrible, possibly more horrible than the damage caused by the wave, in terms of well horribleness.

Earthquake detection is also kind of a waste. Sometimes we get a heads up that anytime from now until a day or so we may have an earthquake but again what do you do? Tell people? "Sometime inbetween now and tomorrow there may be an earthquake" So people stay home and maybe their homes aren't safe for earthquakes. Perhaps people would have been safer in office buildings than at home.

Hurricane technology is much better since they aren't like tornados, earthquakes or vampires. Even still there isn't much in the way of predicting how bad things might get. New Orleans I think everyone saw coming. I knew those levys were breaking with only a single year of Earth Science under my belt. Blame on that I think is with local government. We've had our share of bad situations in NYC but our government is usually on point. There are plenty of cities that riot when the power goes out for 24 hours, hell there are cities in the US that riot when their team wins a championship. We don't do that here. Well Dinkins does that here but for the most part our elected officials know that we can find out where they live.

Anyhow, that's my point:
1. who's paying for it?
2. Suckers that's who
3. WHat good will it do?
4. For the most part not much
5. Vampires are scary


I lost how vampires fit into this but I'm sure it's relevant and I think it speaks for itself. Also I bet communication in Myanmar isn't exactly top notch. If someone were giving away $100 million Euros to anyone who can get the following message to everyone in Myanmar in the next 20 minutes
"George Bush doesn't like black people"
I don't think anyone could win the prise.

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

Agreed that your point
1) is a tough part to solve
3) is wrong because the tsunami warning system installed in the Pacific and Atlantics have proofed to save lives many times. Those who lived in Hawaii or Japan can tell us some of their near hit stories well. The warning system in the Pacifics, PTWC actually suspected the tsunami of the 2004 Tsunami of Indian ~20 minutes after the initial wave but find it hard to warn the countries in the Indian Oceans. Some countries were hit 7-8 hours after the initial wave. Our State Dept acted 7 hours later to warn Africa. If they have the warning system plus the communication infrastructure, many lives would been saved. A common warning system is that the government board cast the warning and instruct them what to do. Areas who have this warning systems do not go into panic when the siren goes off. They learn how to work with the thing. The government has to educate them in advance though.


Wish we don't put only 100 million(I know you just took a random no.) into the research. That's less than the price of a commercial building in NYC nor n days of our military operations in Iraq.

It's hard for most governments to invest the money in something like that. For example, suppose we invest $100 million dollars into tsunami detection technology. The Hurricane detection people will scream and holler. The earthquake people will scream and holler, the homeless advocates will scream and holler, everyone looking for money will complain.

Next November someone will say "Wingo voted to send $100 million dollars overseas rather than feed starving children right here in NY" Another person will say "Wingo voted to spend $100 million dollars overseas which could have been used to *something REALLY good*" etc etc etc

You'll be voted out

Also supposing your $100 million actually finds a technology that can detect a tsunami instantly anywhere in the world. What good does it do? How do you tell everyone? What are they supposed to do?

If I were to tell you that in 20 minutes some state in the US would be hit by a 200 foot tall wave what could we do about it? You could tell them. Quite possibly more people would die in the next 20 minutes of panic, trampling etc than would be killed by the wave. Roads and highways would choke instantly and people would be trapped. It would be horrible, possibly more horrible than the damage caused by the wave, in terms of well horribleness.

Earthquake detection is also kind of a waste. Sometimes we get a heads up that anytime from now until a day or so we may have an earthquake but again what do you do? Tell people? "Sometime inbetween now and tomorrow there may be an earthquake" So people stay home and maybe their homes aren't safe for earthquakes. Perhaps people would have been safer in office buildings than at home.

Hurricane technology is much better since they aren't like tornados, earthquakes or vampires. Even still there isn't much in the way of predicting how bad things might get. New Orleans I think everyone saw coming. I knew those levys were breaking with only a single year of Earth Science under my belt. Blame on that I think is with local government. We've had our share of bad situations in NYC but our government is usually on point. There are plenty of cities that riot when the power goes out for 24 hours, hell there are cities in the US that riot when their team wins a championship. We don't do that here. Well Dinkins does that here but for the most part our elected officials know that we can find out where they live.

Anyhow, that's my point:
1. who's paying for it?
2. Suckers that's who
3. WHat good will it do?
4. For the most part not much
5. Vampires are scary


I lost how vampires fit into this but I'm sure it's relevant and I think it speaks for itself. Also I bet communication in Myanmar isn't exactly top notch. If someone were giving away $100 million Euros to anyone who can get the following message to everyone in Myanmar in the next 20 minutes
"George Bush doesn't like black people"
I don't think anyone could win the prise.

 

[jhale]

from a times article "The United States announced it might send $250,000 worth of aid, but said the shipment was conditional on an American disaster response team being allowed into the country as well."

wtf, $250,000 ? what in the hell is that going to do? I understand not wanting the Burmese government to steal the relief money, but I hope the US steps up it's donations and gets them into the right hands.

 

[inkblue]

:shhh: tHey dont have oiL... not reaLLy an important country