Think about it
Preparedness
By Jun Velasco
“Opportunity has the uncanny habit of favoring those who have paid the price of years of preparation,” E.C. Mckenzie
AN observant broadcaster described our tarpaulin and buntings-ornamented Dagupan as “Tarpaulin City.”
We wish to thank City hall for putting up a Pacebook Magazine Award tarpaulin for Mayor Belen Fernandez as Pangasinan Achiever with her picture and ours (thank you), and those of former President Fidel V. Ramos, former Speaker Joe de Venecia and Capitol Post publisher Mita Sison-Duque in front of the Dagupan West Central School.
Last week, however, a new tarpaulin for Pacebook replaced the old one with new names and faces.
Salamat na balbaleg.
* * * *
We have nothing but praise for the city government’s proactive disaster-preparedness program with former police officer Carlito Ocampo and management professor Nick Melecio at the helm.
At city consultant Nick’s invitation, we had a lunch date with a climate surveillance team led by Engr. A. Lanuza who lamented the city’s Jurassic lack of preparation for massive calamities lurking in the ocean and the bowels of the earth.
No less than former Speaker Joe de Venecia, a co-chair of an international global climate committee, had earlier sounded an alarm on Pangasinan within the path of tsunami and storm surge.
In the same vein, a Pentagon report Friday warned about “rising global temperatures” that would give rise to tsunamis in the Pacific Ocean.
At the Balon Dagupan seminar, we were again briefed that our city is “in the precise path” of killer tsunamis or storm surge, “which may strike any time,” the Phivolcs team said.
But don’t weep, because unlike before, “the city has launched a scientific preparation, thanks to our proactive Mayor Belen Fernandez who has formed a team that works on a 24-hour basis,” says Nick.
A confidant since pre-martial law days, Nick lamented the city had not zeroed in on any meaningful response mechanism after the holocaust that flattened it in l990 and lately, the Typhoon Pepeng killer flood. The task force is now in place, he said.
A new Mother Nature’s fury, according to Phivolcs executives, could be more lethal.
Engineer Lanuza of Phivocs has called for a sense of alertness on a 24-hour basis saying the danger is real and threatening, and that any Nature upheaval that may strike anytime could wipe an entire village or clusters of communities especially those located near the sea.
Far from being an alarmist, Professor Nick would want the media and civic centers to be focused and alert vis a vis the omnipresence of a storm surge or tsunami in Phivolcs’ charts.
The Friday seminar training was opened by P. Inspector Ocampo, PARMC head; overview by Engr. Lanuza of DOST/Phivolcs; Mayor Fernandez was scheduled to give the closing remarks yesterday.
We recall an old adage, “an ounce of prevention is better than cure.”
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