Earthquakes: How tech tools can mitigate catastrophic impacts

The recent and frequent earthquakes—roughly four of them in the last 30 days around the Delhi-NCR region—have caused panic among the residents, forcing them to run out of their homes and offices. This region lies in earthquake zone 4, denoting a high-risk area. This is primarily because of its proximity to the Himalayan region, which is extremely fragile and prone to shaking. Earthquakes as a disaster have been causing a lot of damage to life and property across regions since the beginning of time. The uncertainty of its occurrence and the failure to predict it well before time, despite the technological advancements, are what make it even more catastrophic. Climate change has led to extreme weather events. Droughts, floods, and cyclones have been reported to get worse as global warming increases and changes in climate worsen. However, when we think about  climate change led disasters, earthquakes generally don’t really come to our mind. To even establish the connection between the two—climate change and earthquakes—makes one ponder and wonder. But according to recent research, the changing climate can alter activities below the surface of the earth and have an impact on earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Up to four meters of rainwater during the summer monsoon season squeeze the crust horizontally and vertically, thus making it stable. The effective “rebound” that occurs when this water evaporates in the winter destabilizes the area and increases the frequency of earthquakes. Climate change may make this occurrence more intense. Climate models predict that the future now will result in an increase in the intensity of monsoon rainfall in southern Asia. This can potentially intensify the winter rebound and result in more earthquake activity. Beyond merely precipitation, the weight of water has an effect on the Earth’s crust that also affects glacial ice. Parts of the Earth’s crust began to rebound upwards approximately 10,000 years ago as heavy glacial ice masses thawed at the conclusion of the previous ice age. Scotland has elevated beaches that show signs of this process, known as isostatic rebound; some of these beaches are up to 45 meters above sea level today. Research from Scandinavia indicates that between 11,000 and 7,000 years ago, multiple earthquake events were likely caused by this uplift in addition to the geological instability of the area. A few of these earthquakes even had magnitudes higher than 8.0, which denotes significant damage and fatalities. The worry is that comparable consequences might arise elsewhere if glacier ice continues to melt as it does now. To reduce the damage it causes to people and property around, there are several established disaster risk measures that can be adopted. One of the major ways through which risk can be reduced is through good and reliable data. The Android app-MyShake uses the device’s built-in sensor to identify active earthquakes. After setting the phone down on a level surface and letting it take a half-hour to adjust, it starts “listening” for vibrations that could potentially interfere with its integrated accelerometer. The MyShake database is automatically updated with any information that matches the characteristics of an earthquake. The University of California, Berkeley team behind MyShake intends to develop an iPhone app and eventually create a global network of MyShake users. Similar to MyShake, LastQuake is a smartphone app, however instead of using the hardware built into the phone, it depends on volunteer reporting. A group at the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre in Essonne, France, developed the LastQuake system, which searches Twitter and other public networks for seismic activity reports. People who live close to earthquake epicenters can rate the strength of the tremor by answering a questionnaire. India is strongly committed to following the 2015-2030 Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction which recommends citizen participation in risk-related scientific activities. It can be very effective in increasing risk awareness and preparedness. The crowdsourcing approach assumes that information and evidence collected from several citizens gives a bottom-up method that improves knowledge and numerous studies have demonstrated that such approaches can support disaster management, disaster assessment, and emergency decision making. The author is a Masters student at TERI School of Advanced Studies. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.