News and Features
PHIVOLCS and SWEEP Schools Collaborate To Improve Disaster Preparedness In The Country
[August 1, 2007/ Manila] - The Philippines lies within the Pacific Ring of Fire — a zone of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Phivolcs records an average of 16 to 20 ground-shakings per day. Major ones that rocked the country in recent decades include the 7.3 magnitude earthquake in 1968 that toppled the Ruby Tower, the 1976 Moro Gulf 7.9 magnitude quake that caused a tsunami killing more than 6,000 people, and the devastating July 16, 1990 Luzon tremor.
Natural hazards may be beyond our ability to control, but armed with predictive understanding and the necessary technological capabilities, we can develop preventive measures, which, if built into a societal framework can mitigate the effects brought by nature’s wrath and ultimately save lives.
In pursuit of such an undertaking, the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) and concerned Smart Wireless Engineering Education Program (SWEEP) partner schools, through the initiative of Smart Communications, Inc. (SMART), are pulling their resources together to advance community disaster preparedness in the country.
A staunch advocate of disaster preparedness, Smart has been working with Phivolcs in providing selected municipalities with early warning devices called batingaws (oxygen tank), communication equipment ranging from satellite phones to handheld radio units and information leaflets about community-based early warning system.
By involving schools under SWEEP, Smart is confident that a lot more can be done.
“Disaster preparedness is everyone’s concern and partner schools under SWEEP are only too happy to get involved. We are also looking into expanding this nationwide disaster research and monitoring network to also include partners under the Smart Schools Program,” says Ramon R. Isberto, Smart Public Affairs Group head.
“By linking up the wide network of SWEEP schools with Phivolcs to research on low-cost remote monitoring systems, we hope to create a vast network of monitoring stations across the country via SWEEP and help out in the disaster preparedness and response program of the country,” says Darwin Flores, Smart Public Affairs Group community partnerships senior manager .
Phivolcs is similarly optimistic that the collaboration will accomplish things with far-reaching benefits.
“We will be working with the schools not just in the field of seismology, but also in volcanology and extreme weather hazards,” says Bartolome Bautista, D.Sc., Deputy Director of Phivolcs.
“Together, we can develop low-cost devices such as rain gauges. We can distribute these to local government units and teach them how to monitor the level of rainfall in their respective communities so that once the threshold level is exceeded, they can immediately advise the people in affected areas to relocate to higher grounds and avoid steep slopes,” he says.
An improvement in earthquake monitoring is also called for. “Right now, we only have 64 seismic stations nationwide to detect ground movement. Ideally, we should have a minimum of 200 stations for better and more accurate monitoring,” reveals Bautista.
According to him, the ultimate goal is for the schools to build their own network that will facilitate interaction and exchange of data such as earthquake location and magnitude, and share these gathered information with Phivolcs. This process will give Phivolcs a wide and extensive coverage to ably generate a data base that can be used as basis for conducting earthquake research, improving knowledge about active faults to learn the potential hazards these present, and in developing measures to reduce the risk.
For its part, Phivolcs will help implement, monitor and evaluate the disaster monitoring projects identified by the SWEEP partner schools. “We will collaborate with Smart and the schools to ensure the success of the projects, and more importantly, we will act as the technical consultants for the projects identified. We can provide testing simulation, comparison against standards, and calibration of prototypes produced by the program,” says Phivolcs Director Dr. Renato U. Solidum, Jr.
“In the long term, we want to include all of these in our earthquake monitoring network. The more sensors we have, the faster we can locate, the better we can get the parameters of an earthquake for our warning for earthquakes and also for tsunami. So this is a very promising project, and I think given the ideas that can be generated or used by our professors, I have high hopes for this partnership,” adds Solidum.
As preparation for the job at hand, professors, department heads and college deans of SWEEP partner schools attended a weeklong seminar conducted by Phivolcs. The ‘Introductory Course on Seismology and Seismic Observation System’ provided the school representatives with the working knowledge and understanding about seismology in the context of Philippine setting. The seminar also gave them an idea of the kind of intervention or help Phivolcs needs to effectively carrying out its mandate.
The ten schools represented at the seminar are set to buckle down to work. In a year’s time, they are to develop an intensity meter, a seismometer, and a seisComp. The long-term project, with a three-year time frame, is the installation of a seismograph and a monitoring station.
The schools also agreed to each form a SWEEP-Phivolcs projects team that will consist of a project coordinator, instrument engineer, civil-geodetic engineer, lead programmer and data communication transmission engineer.
“Our school is excited to be part of this project,” says Engr. Eliseo Linog, professor of Electrical Engineering at the Xavier University Cagayan de Oro. “We want to get involved in community service projects that will enable our institution to make a relevant contribution to oursociety.. We don’t have any disaster-related projects, so this is a good opportunity for us. It will be a university cause with the college of Engineering at the forefront.”
Engr. Joseph Karl Salva sees it as a win-win situation. While Phivolcs gets much-welcomed assistance, the University of San Carlos, Cebu City, finds a proper venue to apply findings from studies previously done on disaster preparedness, and to comply with PAASCU’s requirement that schools get involved in community service projects. Salva heads the Special Applications Laboratory of the school’s Electrical Engineering and Communications Engineering (EECE) department.
For Engr. Leah Talusig, ECE department head of the University of Baguio, getting involved gives them the opportunity to be of service to their community. Having lived through the July 16 “Luzon Killer Earthquake” and aware of Baguio’s susceptibility to typhoons and landslides, Talusig is eager to make a difference. “We can help with the information dissemination of Phivolcs. We are even willing to have one monitoring station inside our campus,” she says.
This enthusiasm is shared by Engr. Gladys Paciente, college dean of Science and Technology at the Norte Dame of Marbel University in South Cotabato. “We have been on the lookout for activities of this kind that will allow us to contribute to the good of the country,” she admits.
Fueled by a unique partnership bound by a collective desire to improve public service, particularly in the field of disaster preparedness, the Phivolcs-SWEEP project is a magnitude 10 in nobleness. And, as is true for all worthy causes, the people stand to benefit from this the most. @