Living with Earthquakes: Educating masses through earthquake awareness: North East (NE) India perspective

Abstract

Earthquake is one of the most frightening and destructive phenomena of nature. The northeast India region, as well as its adjoining South-Asian neighbours including Myanmar and Bangladesh, is tectonically and seismically most active. The region categorized under the highest level of seismic hazard potential: Zone V, of the seismic zonation map of India, has experienced nearly 22 large (M ≥7.0) and two great earthquakes (M S ∼ 8.7) in the past 130 years. All these earthquakes caused wide-spread damage over the region. In the recent past, with rapid urbanization combined with a significant population rise as compared to those times when these great/large earthquakes occurred, the seismic vulnerability index has increased manifold. The situation demands widespread dissemination of seismic hazard and preparedness information via community engagement and highlighting on potentially tragic consequences of earthquakes by conducting extensive mock drill exercises & earthquake awareness programmes. In this paper, the role and efforts of the statuary bodies in the region, such as National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and CSIR – Northeast Institute of Science and Technology (NEIST) and societal program of Academy of Scientific and Innovative research, to mitigate and minimize seismic hazard by extensive dissemination of earthquake information, via scientific scenario and impact assessment, is holistically compiled.