New Delhi: India has put in place an
effective system to issue Tsunami alerts after the catastrophe
had hit country in 2004, a senior government official said.
Ruling out any shortcoming in the tsunami alert system
in the country, Secretary of the Ministry of Earth Sciences
Secretary Shailesh Naik said that Indian National Centre for
Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) is a world-class tsunami
warning system.
"This has been proved now, as we were able to
issue the first bulletin just seven minutes after the massive
quake in Japan, ruling out a tsunami threat for the Indian
Ocean, where as the American tsunami warning system, National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) issued its
first alert 12 minutes after the massive earthquake near the
coast of Honshu," he said.
The Indian tsunami warning system, which was conceived
after the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, works by
assessing data it received from seismic stations, sea level
gauges, bottom pressure recorders (tsunami buoys) and predicts
the water level changes expected at various locations.
"Following a big earthquake, the system can issue a
tsunami alert within in 10 minutes not only in India but also
for other neighbouring countries," Naik said.
The Rs 125-crore tsunami warning centre set up in
2007 at the INCOIS in Hyderabad has assessed 25-30 major
earthquakes in the last three years.
PTI
