A new system to avoid the catastrophes caused by Tsunamis in Third World countries making use of the international cooperation

Paper number

IAC-05-B2.2.07

Author

Mr. Fernando Martinez, Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, Spain

Year

2005

Abstract

Last December, it was possible to verify that, unfortunately, there are a lot of countries in the Third World that do not have a reliable alarm system to warn their population before the threat of Tsunamis. And the fact is that, despite all the advanced systems that developed countries possess to foretell these kinds of phenomena, it does not exist a communication system to inform people in danger in the underdevelopment countries.

The idea of this paper is to make a study about the design and installation in seaside places of Third World countries of acoustic alarm devices that would be directly activated through satellite as soon as the danger of a Tsunami was detected and, in this way, to warn population immediately. These devices would consist on a telecommunications receiver that, when reached by the satellite signal, would go off to let people know about the danger.

The main advantage of this system is the instantaneous warning to the affected population, since once a Tsunami is detected at the control centre of a developed country, people of the zone in danger can know about it, instead of communicating the situation to the authorities of the correspondant country and then waiting until people in risk is informed, which results on a considerably waste of vital time. Moreover, as these zones are not easily accessible and do not have good communications, it is difficult to arrive in time to avoid a catastrophe. In contrast, using the satellites is possible to send the alarm immediately to any part in the world, using for example Galileo, the european global navigation satellite system, which will provide a global coverage for the whole Earth.

This method, at the same time, is very economical for the underdevelopment countries, since it is only the installation of this receiver with the alarm system what it is needed. In this way, it is important to remark that this system is based on international cooperation and the solidarity of most advanced countries, since these ones detect the Tsunami and, through their fleet of satellites, send the alarm to the precise place where it is going to strike.

This paper will centre around the design of this receiver system and its possible cost, and will analyse the strategic points where these devices should be placed.

Abstract document

IAC-05-B2.2.07.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-05-B2.2.07.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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