Kerala: What cost to make coasts safe?

Thiruvananthapuram: Government agencies have the best of technologies and equipment to predict the weather and its significant changes. However, when it came to the crunch, it did not help the needy, especially the fishermen. It was the same case when tsunami hit the state in the last decade.

Vincent, father of Vinesh (16), collapses at his residence after a long wait. Vinesh is thought to be the youngest person involved in the tragedy.

The devastation caused by cyclone Ockhi has triggered a blame game between the state and central governments and various departments. The Indian Space Research Organisation has launched weather satellites to monitor earth's weather and climate as well as meteorological satellites to see more than clouds and cloud systems. The ISRO has also launched six Cartosat series of satellites, a type of earth observation satellites indigenously built by India.

Mother of Jose, who is still missing in the sea, is all tears as she takes part in the road blockade at Chakka junction on Sunday.

These satellites are a part of the Indian remote sensing programme for resource management and monitoring, which have been developed by space scientists at ISRO's various centres over the last several decades. "These are available to users like Indian Army and state governments for the Cartosat series and state remote sensing centres as well. Our job is over once we hand over the technology to them. It is the state's lack of coordination which caused the lapse in the present case," said a top official of VSSC.

The ISRO has developed a search and rescue beacon which is being used on fishermen's boats. This has since been transferred to KELTRON. The moment the fishing boat is in distress the signal will reach the harbour. The harbour officials and Coast Guard can pull back to safety the fishermen who are in distress. But this has not been popularised due to mechanical issues. Similarly, when Chennai experienced heavy floods last year, the National Remote Sensing Centre in Hyderabad provided the images of the inclement weather in advance.

"Kerala does not make use of such advanced technologies. The then Tamil Nadu government could prepare for the floods, but still they had a hard time due to the massive impact. Similarly, Andhra Pradesh has utilized the benefits of Bhuvan, a software application developed by ISRO which allows users to explore a 2D/3D representation of the surface of the earth," said another VSSC scientist.

But Kerala is yet to tap the potential of Bhuvan software. Dr. M. G. Manoj, research scientist with Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT), says that if the cyclone had hit the inland of Kerala instead of the coastal areas, the state would not have withstood the impact. But Kerala would not experience such storms as normally it would be in the north-west direction which would recurve towards Oman coast.

"This is the first time such a severe cyclone has hit the Kerala coast. Cyclones have hit Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal and Orissa which was shattered by the super cyclone in 1999. Not all the time the technology can come to our aid as there are several parameters involved in detecting the speed of the wind", said Dr Manoj, who is attached to the Advanced Centre for Atmospheric Radar Research (ACARR).

He says it is easy to detect the multi- parameters of the wind speed compared to the rains. But the fishermen are a vulnerable lot as they stay close to the coastal areas. However, Maglin, president of Theeradesha Mahila Vedhi, told DC that the radar system of Coast Guard had not been working in both Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi leaving them in the dark as to what lay in store for them. She recalled that the water sprout that occurred at the Veli beach in Thiruvananthapuram a week ago was the clear sign of a danger lurking in the sea.

"When we warned the authorities about the threat posed by the water sprout, they gave scant regard to it. In fact when tsunami had hit the coastal areas in 2004, fishermen had warned the authorities. We lack technological knowledge, but we are aware of certain threats being posed by nature itself," said Maglin.

She said that various departments having several technologies had failed in their duties. Giving warning at the right time is of utmost importance so that fishermen can be prevented from venturing out into the deep sea, she said. Sanjeev Ghosh, former additional director of fisheries, too opines that the met officials must give the warning at the right time so that the authorities can act. "We failed this time in gauging the situation despite technological strides. Neither the Coast Guard nor the Indian Navy anticipated this kind of an outcome, which could have been avoided," he said.