Unfortunately many of these events are not easy to predict, but between floods and earthquakes there is a big difference. As for typhoons and storms we should suspect by many indications that global warming contributes to exacerbate and increase their number. This situation over the years can only get worse, and the governments of the world should do something now to prevent it. Citizens should make particular pressure on governments to curb emissions.
Earthquakes, however, are due to movements of the tectonic plates of our planet and have always occurred, but there is a common element with the disasters caused by climate. And it's the fact that men should know that these disasters happen and be prepared to face them. But the truth is that we very civilized and modern humans are more vulnerable to these events than our ancestors of thousands of years ago who lived in huts or in caves. Those men had a direct relationship with the Earth and were able to understand long before us when a disaster would strike. Also they hadn't tall houses that can collapse and roads that can channel flood waters, nor garbage that clogs the drains. But because we have all these things, we should try to minimize risks and damages of any disaster. But that almost never is done properly.
Building abuses and summer fires have a lot to do with the level of devastation that we see today in Italy near Messina. The houses built with low quality cement have a lot to do with the deaths and damages caused by april earthquake in Abruzzo. This obviously applies to many other areas of the world, and the more a country is poor, the easier it is that disasters, whether natural or not, will cause a high death toll and many damages because most of the houses were poorly constructed and not able to resist, and the environment close to human settlements has been ravaged to the point of aggravating the toll of a natural disaster. The dramatic death toll in the Indian Ocean tsunami of late 2004, 230,000 deaths in 11 different nations, has been aggravated in many countries by the destruction of coral reefs and mangrove forests that were once a natural protection of the coast. Disasters like this should teach men to live and build respecting the land they inhabit, or any natural disaster will always have grave consequences. It's never too late to learn, but it is about time to do so.
Francesco Defferrari
Comments
bisogna piantarla con i buonismi: il dissesto ambientale non è fatalità ma frutto della speculazione edilizia prodotta dall'avidità umana e dalla mafia siciliana. E di cui sono responsabili anche le popolazioni che ci vivevano.
E giusto quindi che lo Stato spenda tutte le risorse per i soccorsi ma i soldi della ricostruzione dovrebbero venire solo da quegli enti locali ( comuni e regione) che hanno fatto in modo che avvenisse lo scempio idrogeologico. Altrimenti non ci si responsabilizza e certe tragedie saranno destinate a ripetersi.
Alluvione in Sicilia: ennesimo disastro annunciato. Per prevenire, stop ai fondi pubblici che finanziano la speculazione edilizia
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