Galle
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Introduction Environment and Sustainable Development Programme of the United Nations University coordinated a Post Tsunami Survey in Sri Lanka where 3 international and 15 Sri Lankan teams conducted a survey of three Tsunami affected cities in Sri Lanka. The objectives of the survey:
The survey was carried out in the towns of Galle, Hambantota and Trincomalee. Primary data was the elevation improvement, followed by building damage estimation and the wave heights and wave run-up information. The main activities of the survey: 1. High resolution mapping of affected area (with RS, GPS and GIS) 2. Areas covered are Galle, Hambantota and Trincomalee for this initial exercise. 3. Detailed survey of localized wave impacts, in conjunction with satellite images. 4. Field survey in Eastern, Southern and Western provinces with visits to government and private organizations 5. Land use pattern and essential industry in the affected communities. 6. Interviewing stakeholders in Tourism industry, Fishing industry? 7. Collaboration of completed, ongoing and planned work by national and international agencies These activities were carried out in support of variety of objectives proposed by the participating organizations. The expected outcomes of the survey are,
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Output Data available in ArcIMS server
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Overview
Sri Lanka experienced its worst natural disaster on the 26th of December 2004. The massive earthquake registering 9.0 on the Richter scale that struck off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia at 00 59 GMT set off a series of tsunami waves that reached coastal areas of Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Malaysia, the Maldives, Mauritius, Myanmar, Reunion, Seychelles, Somalia, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, and Thailand from about 15 min in Indonesia, 2 hours in Sri Lanka and 14 hours in Cape Town, South Africa.
Sri Lanka was one of the hardest hit countries in terms of loss of life, infrastructure and assets. Between two to three hours after the first earthquake, waves reached more than two thirds of the coastal area of Sri Lanka. Current estimates stand at more than 31000 lives lost, over 4000 missing and 1 million affected. Almost half of the affected lost their livelihoods. According to the CRED database, Sri Lanka with 1809 persons killed per 1 million inhabitants had the highest number of per capita casualties from all natural disasters in the world in 2004. Indonesia, the worst affected from the Tsunami had 759 people killed per million. The estimated economic losses vary from around 6.0% of the national GDP (by ADB/JBIC/World Bank) to 8% (by TAFREN). These are staggering numbers for any country, but especially for Sri Lanka when they are compared in relative terms and the capacity to recover.
Early warning and evacuation are the most effective response strategies for such very low frequency high impact disasters. At the same time, the reconstruction now taking place should be based on an assesment of risks and appropriate measurs to minimize losses from a future similar disaster. Although the frequency of Tsunami in Sri Lanka is very small, we should avert rebuilding the same disaster. To assess risks, accurate representation of topography is a pre-requisite when inundation impacts on people are considered. Similarly, the surface roughness of land effectively determines flow velocity and hence flow accumulation. Inundation velocities are much higher in smooth surfaces such as water bodies and therefore the roughness differences should be adequately incorporated in the simulation exercises.
In this survey, Elevation data, Land cover data and Population data, were compiled, suplementing missing data to facilitate hazard and risk assessment in three coastal cities in Sri Lanka that represent different physical as well as socio-economic characteristics of the country.