Yesterday’s South China Morning Post’s cover bore a large photo of dead children being taken out of the rubble of a collapsed school in Sichuan.
Today there was the expected rush of letters to the editor of same paper – people morally indignant at having had to suffer such a shocking and distasteful image over breakfast. One imagines some people having to fight their toast down.
I also thought the photo fairly disturbing, but then I started reading the articles accompanying it. You know what? I don’t think SCMP printing that photo is reprehensible, disgusting and outrageous. What is, though, and more, is that the collapsed schools (and there were many) were found to be built with inferior building materials in a shoddy manner; hastily put up and without any thoughts of students’ safety.
Ultimately it’s the Chinese government and its failure to rein in corrupt officials that has to bear responsibility for this. In this culture of corner-cutting, kickbacks and graft, where 40 companies can get together to produce infant milk powder without nutrition, killing dozens of babies, are we really surprised to see that construction companies don’t mind putting a whole school at risk to make a few thousand yuan?
But wait, there’s more. Now scientists are saying the earthquake could have been caused to a large degree by the Three Gorges Dam; its massive weight of water influencing the geology around it.
Earthquakes, landslips and other “natural” disasters – exactly the type of thing knowledgable geologists and scientists warned against before the dam was built.
Another feather in the cap for our great omniscients up north.
I don’t think such photographs should be published out of respect for the dead and their families. I would be very angry if my child was used in this way.
Hong Kong press always likes to give out gory details. As if they think we like it.
What’s worse, as far as English dailies are concerned, the decision is (usually) made by a gwailo editor. Duh! But Chinese dailies are worse.
Blame it on the pervert paparazzi?
Ciao!
I would be angry too, but much more angry that my children had been killed because some bastard village head/mayor/party official/contractor thought it was okay to skimp on the stuff that keeps a structure standing up under pressure.
As devastating and horrible as the earhquake in China is, we should also take time to think about all the people that have died and those that are contuning to suffer as a result of the disater that recently oc curred in Myanma. Where the death toll now stands between 68,833 and 127,990 people.
Yes, we hear a lot and see a lot of pictures about China, but we should still remember that at the moment the death toll from the present earthquake stands at 14,463. Nowhere near the figure that was reported when in 1976 a similar disaster occurred and up to 300,000 died.
As I recollect the Three Gorges Dam hadn’t been even started. If anything we can put some of the blame, as ah-Sin says on the people who played a part in the building and construction of many of the homes.
Let us remember everyone.
Actually, I am sad that most casualties seem to be children and teenagers.
It was heartbreaking to see parents cry (on various TV clips – NOW TV news [Channel 332]), and NOW TV is doing a good job of covering it almost round the clock).
It seems mankind needs tragedies to improve. May be, this is the start where China actually enforces laws to stop shoddy constructions and abolish corruption? One can but, just hope.
Ciao!
Jim See,
You got one thing right: “As I recollect the Three Gorges Dam hadn’t been even started.”
I read the articles via Ceci’s link about the Three Gorges Dam (above). And while I know that the volume of water (and also air) could be, at times, devastating, I doubt that the tectonic plates are chicken bones. If you know what I mean.
Though, I will agree with Ceci and others that the increased volume of water over a period of time could result in geological changes.
As far as I know, and to the best of my knowledge, the area is prone to earthquakes as it is based on the tectonic plate that borders the Eurasian tectonic plate.
This scenario was created when the present day Indian subcontinent broke away from what we know as Australia (today), millions of years ago, and clashed into the Eurasian tectonic plate. This is also the reason why the world’s tallest mountains (in the Himalayas) came into being. And they are reaching skywards every year (think pressure).
Actually, all continents on planet Earth broke away from each other in different sizes and forms, and there you have the basics of tectonic plates. And also, seismology.
I will spare you the details about the core of planet Earth and all the layers above it. But think about it. True North and Magnetic North are not one and the same. And never have been as far as humans can remember.
This all ties into the above.
One thing I am sure about (as I reiterate that I am not a geologist and I did mention, “to the best of my knowledge”), seismologists in China (or around the world) could have predicted this earthquake. Why they didn’t? Well, that just baffles me.
Ciao!
NK, I am not a Geologist either like you, and I can see you have about as much knowledge on the subject as your average “armchair geologist” but I do know about the basic theory of an earthquake.
In case yo need some refreshment of your fundemental geology, earthquakes happen when the tectonic plates underlying the continents slip past each other violently, causing severe vibrations. According to theory, unlike eclipses, predicting earthquakes was entirely impossible prior to the 1970s. However, some headway has been made in recent decades.
To my knowledge, also somone not specifically qualified in the subject are, in February 1975, scientists in China managed to actually predict an earthquake five hours in advance. The earthquake occurred in Haicheng in northeast China and it was the first time an earthquake prediction bore true. As a result of this prediction, millions of people had time to evacuate their homes and factories before the earthquake hit, saving tens of thousands of lives. Although many towns were totally destroyed, only a few hundred people died.
From basic knowledge, I rember that another Chinese earthquake took place near T’ang-shan in August 1976. Although the earthquake was predicted a few years in advance, around 700,000 people still died from the quake. Long-term predictions therfore seem to have limited value.
Earthquakes can be scientifically predicted by observing tiny cracks in rocks and how they widen when the rock is under stress. Other changes are also observable when a rock starts to compress, including changes in electrical resistance and the speed at which sound waves propagate through the rock. The swelling of cracks in a rock before it breaks is called dilantancy. It begins when the force on the rock is about half the force required for it to break.
I am just a bit concerned and confused as to why the predictions about earthquakes in mainland China, given it susceptability to such geologic incidents that Chinese scientists did not manage to predict the current event?
“Armchair geologist.”
Yup, I already said I am not qualified.
The last paragraph from your comment and my comment end in the same note. Perhaps, everyone was distracted by the grand Olympic Torch Relay, seismologists included!
Earthquakes and tectonic plates aside, I do have considerable knowledge about true and magnetic north. But that is hardly relevant (though distantly) to this topic.
Have fun, and best to you and yours, Jim See.
Ciao!
I only quoted what professional geologists and other professional scientists said and have said about the Three Gorges, not realising that Jimsee of course knew better.
In fact I’ve been following this three gorges rigmarole since the 90’s and although I know nothing about geology, geography, tectonic plates, all the rest of it, I’ve always been against that dam for various reasons. First and formemost because it is a plan first flouted in 1920 or thereabouts, then left to rot until Mao caught wind of it, and then set into being by people who had only political reasons in mind; i.e. what Mao said in the 50’s is sure to get anyone backing and political clout 40 years after his death.
And that’s exactly what happened. In China of yesteryear and today, anyone who can carry out any harebrained scheme of the Chairman is bound to get backing.
The Three gorges dam will end in disaster and the little increase in electricity that can be gleaned from it will be offset and has already been offset by the huge human suffering it has led to. Floods are still happening and the many people who haven’t been allocated new houses are still miling around, causing societal upset. The few lucky ones who have found new dwellings hundreds of meters above the old water line of the Yangtse are still not happy because the new plots of farmland alocated to them are inferior to the ones they had before in growing potential.
In fact most of the 1.5 million (and counting) people relocated by the three gorges project have come out as being far worse off than before. As usual when a communist or any other agent tries to mess seriously with nature.
I agree with you Ceci that the Three Gorges Dam was and is a crap idea.
I think one of the parameters involved was the romanticized feeling of grandness about the entire project. And especially the desire to show the world that China is there!
Well, shit happens. And someone’s gotta clean it. In this case, Mother Nature?
Ciao!
Mother Nature, unfortunately, is doing her best, and doing the only thing she can do under the circumstances. She’s doing what any of us would do if something irritated us: Try to get rid of it. Now the most irritating and dangerous thing facing mother nature is, guess what: Us! So of course she must get rid of us.
As soon as the humans on the globe are down to a manageable number and no longer trying to bend nature to our will, mother nature will be quite sweet again and willing to negotiate. But as long as we keep up this insane notion that the world is here for us to do with as we please, to rape, pillage and devastate, we shouldn’t be too surprised if the much put-upon World (Mother Nature) fights back with every weapon in her arsenal.
And her weapons are formidable. What’s all the money we have in the bank and all the stocks, bonds and shares, all the money we’ve spent on insurance and walls around our property really worth? We think that just because we’ve signed a piece of paper we can relax and feel safe.
But when the wall of water comes crushing down on our house, when the building holding our muchm fought-for piece of insurance paper crumbles and turns to dust and the only things that matter are the same as they were in the stone age: Survival; water, food and shelter, then we’ll see who has the last laugh.
I think the one having the last braying laugh will be mother bloody nature. It won’t be any of us.
“I think the one having the last braying laugh will be mother bloody nature. It won’t be any of us.”
Ha ha. No wonder you write books. You are gifted with words.
Ciao!
Are you (NK and ah-Sin) blaming the wrong person (thing)?
What is is the insurance companies write in their samll print….. “caused by an act of God”……
Isn’t he the one to blame? and should we really be putting all the blame on so called “mother nature”
But on second thought, maybe you are right, lets put it all down to “mother nature” because if their was really a God, why the hell does he kill innocent people?
If there is a God, I hope he can read blogs!
Mother Nature and God are a great couple. And when they get
arousedexcited, shit happens.As to whether they read blogs? How would I know?
Ciao!