A team of 14 senior editors and journalists from Jammu and Kashmir, which is currently on a week-long tour of the state of Telangana, was on Monday given a detailed insider’s view on Tsunami warnings and the challenge of climate change during a tour of INCOIS, or the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, which is an autonomous body that works under the Union Ministry of Earth Sciences.
INCOIS is the country’s key institution for providing ocean data, information and advisory services to society, industry, the government and the scientific community. It does this through sustained oceanic observations and offers constant improvements through systematic and focused research in information management and ocean modelling, which includes how it deals with the monumental challenge of climate change and environmental degradation, besides warnings for an impending Tsunami, as the one India experienced in December 2004.
A senior INCOIS official informed the visiting journalists from J&K about the range of other services that INCOIS provides, including potential fishing zones, advisories on storm surge warnings, ocean state forecasts, coral bleaching alerts and algae bloom information.
He said it is INCOIS’ mission to provide data for all vulnerable cities that lie along India’s is 7,517-long kilometres coastline, which is divided into 5,422 kilometres on the mainland and 2094 on the island territories.
Using artificial intelligence and other technological know-how, the INCOIS official revealed picture-based information on oceanic temperatures and currents, and their daily impact on the subcontinent. Movement of flights across the country were also shown. The process of limited breaking up of energy particles was also shown.
He said Indian Ocean Basin had two main Tsunamigenic zones – Makran and Sunda. Preliminary estimation of a tsunami hazard was associated with the Makran Subduction Zone (MSZ) in the north-western Indian Ocean.
He further informed that INCOIS had started operations with a single service 25 years ago, and now was giving a wide and expanded range of climate change related services not only for India, but also for the immediate neighbourhood, which done and recognised by Unesco. On the issue of landslides occurring in various parts of India, including in the hilly regions like J&K, he said INCOIS is conducting studies and revealed that there is no proper mechanism in place currently to predict the onset of a landslide or earthquake, adding no can really tell when it is actually going to happen.
For example, he said that the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was the third largest earthquake in the world since 1900. It measured 9.1-magnitude on the Richter scale and occurred 18.6 miles (30 kilometres) below the ocean floor. It had a rupture length of roughly 800 miles (1,300 kilometres) and it occurred off the west coast of Indonesia’s northern Sumatra. The earthquake was one of the deadliest natural disasters in recorded history and prompted a worldwide humanitarian response and donations of over 14 billion dollars.
A brief description was also given about India's marine fisheries, which formed a significant part of the economy, contributing to food security, employment, and foreign exchange.