Role of the Navy in Disaster Management in Sri Lanka Full text
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
1.1 Disasters in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka is known as the “Pearl of the Indian Ocean, Island Paradise and more recently, A Land like no other “. Words such as hazards and Disasters were very rare in Sri Lanka and people lived with seasonal floods, droughts, landslides and cyclones as if they are part of their lives. Perceptions of people on natural hazards were of a little suffering, which they had to overcome with their own methodologies. However a significant change has occurred in the last decade or so. It has come to a level where Sri Lanka has been identified as a Global Natural disaster risk Hotspot by International Research Institute for Climatic Prediction in USA specializing on climatic prediction and risk mapping.
The drought in 2002, flash floods in 2003 and the now famous tsunami in 2004 have qualified Sri Lanka as a regular natural disaster prone country. A man made disaster, two-decade-old terrorism issue, which devastated the North, and the East of the country, still remains unsolved. The series of unforeseen natural hazards have affected the Southern, Western, North Central, Uva, Wayamba and Sabaragamuwa provinces. The indications that seismically unstable sub tectonic plate developing just 400 km south of Sri Lanka has prompted Sri Lankan scientists to link that with minor tremors which were troubling Central province since lately (Dissanayake, 2005). From those information it is evident that whole of Sri Lanka is threatened by one or more hazards throughout the year. As an aid to civil power, Sri Lanka Navy has been actively involved in Disaster Management activities in Sri Lanka at various levels. It is in this environment that the researcher undertook this study on the Role played by Armed Forces as a whole and Navy in particular in managing the natural disasters.
1.2 Significance of Disasters
Sri Lanka experienced its worst ever floods in 2003 in the southern province and there were predictions that floods
Introduction
1.1 Disasters in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka is known as the “Pearl of the Indian Ocean, Island Paradise and more recently, A Land like no other “. Words such as hazards and Disasters were very rare in Sri Lanka and people lived with seasonal floods, droughts, landslides and cyclones as if they are part of their lives. Perceptions of people on natural hazards were of a little suffering, which they had to overcome with their own methodologies. However a significant change has occurred in the last decade or so. It has come to a level where Sri Lanka has been identified as a Global Natural disaster risk Hotspot by International Research Institute for Climatic Prediction in USA specializing on climatic prediction and risk mapping.
The drought in 2002, flash floods in 2003 and the now famous tsunami in 2004 have qualified Sri Lanka as a regular natural disaster prone country. A man made disaster, two-decade-old terrorism issue, which devastated the North, and the East of the country, still remains unsolved. The series of unforeseen natural hazards have affected the Southern, Western, North Central, Uva, Wayamba and Sabaragamuwa provinces. The indications that seismically unstable sub tectonic plate developing just 400 km south of Sri Lanka has prompted Sri Lankan scientists to link that with minor tremors which were troubling Central province since lately (Dissanayake, 2005). From those information it is evident that whole of Sri Lanka is threatened by one or more hazards throughout the year. As an aid to civil power, Sri Lanka Navy has been actively involved in Disaster Management activities in Sri Lanka at various levels. It is in this environment that the researcher undertook this study on the Role played by Armed Forces as a whole and Navy in particular in managing the natural disasters.
1.2 Significance of Disasters
Sri Lanka experienced its worst ever floods in 2003 in the southern province and there were predictions that floods
Bibliography: Carter W. Nick, Disaster Management, A disaster Manager’s hand book, Asian Development Bank, 1992 Dissanayake C.B., seminar on “Tsunami and the impact on Sri Lanka”, Department of Geology, University of Peradeniya, 15th January 2005. Doak Carey Cox, Progress in tsunami research, 1960-62, Hawaii Institute of Geophysics., University of Hawaii, 1963 Eikenberg C Herath S., Information Technology Tools for Natural Disaster Risk Management, United Nations University, 1999 Loudon and Loudon, Management Information Systems, Prentice Hall, 2003 Mittler Elliott, A case study of Florida 's emergency management since Hurricane Andrew, Natural Hazards Research and Applications Information Center, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado, 1998 Sri Lanka Navy, Naval History Book, 2002 U.S. Government, 21st Century Complete Guide to FEMA - Federal Emergency Management Agency by Progressive Management, 2004 U.S Web Sites and online documents Basaen, I., Contribution to the UN-ISDR’s online discussion on the Draft Framework to Guide and Monitor Disaster Risk Reduction, www.unisdr.org, 2003. Benouiar, D. Contribution to the UN-ISDR’s online discussion on the Draft Framework to Guide and Monitor International disasters, 2003 Davis, I