Reaction Paper: The West Valley Fault: Implications for Earthquake preparedness in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces Yes, I am aware of the west valley fault, as a human being, as a Filipino, and as a student. I think most of the people would do also, but I guess few are not, living in such places that is near the west valley fault system is hand by hand difficult, difficult in the sense that your life could be in danger, in danger by means of its massive impacts due to infrastructures
that could be near
you. We cannot deny that fact that human kill’s human, in the sense that we create
human
made
structures,
for
some
instances,
as that structure
happened to be affected by the earthquake with human residing near the structure, what if the people residing near that structure were never aware of the earthquake? What if inside the structure there was a party? What if the structure was not built well? A lot of remarkable questions would rise up, questions that can be answered if you are really aware, as a result possible things would happen and in the end the structure would cost life as it collapsed,
well
obviously,
we
cannot
say
that
earthquake
is
the
one
responsible for everything, a lot of people have misconception on the process by which they concluded, it is wrong to say “because of the earthquake my son died”, it is you to be blamed not the earthquake for the reason that you weren’t careful enough, and aware and common sense, earthquake is a natural occurrence in the Earth, unless it was a man-made earthquake due to explosions detonated, why didn’t you gave awareness to yourself that this happening would happen?
And in such things, why not be aware? Do you
really care about your family? If so, why weren’t you aware? It is very important that we people would have at least the guts to be aware of something most especially things that would cost something in our life. Simple things could be deadly, for just a simple awareness, you can save your life and others as well. From the lecture series, it was a mixed joy and excitement, it was a pleasure to see plus attend a lecture with the current PHIVOCS Director Dr Renato Solidum, Jr.
Philippines as phone too many natural hazards such as
earthquake, tsunami, volcanic eruption, landslide, flood, storm, and typhoon added the fact that our country is located as part of the ring of fire and the fact that Philippines have many active volcano. In connection with the lecture, there were dates that were cited such that there were 90 destructive earthquakes occurred for the past 400 years, due to Philippines as bounded by major plates and the major faults that generated earthquake. The tragic of 1990 which an earthquake hit the parts of northern Luzon and central Luzon, well the year where I am not yet alive, well, as a human it was a tragedy that marked the Philippine history for which it remain a devastating moments for the people whom experienced the tragedy which I can say that maybe due to lack of preparedness and awareness of the situation, and resulted to that massive devastation. As said from the lecture, people and structures are affected by natural hazards maybe because of unsafe location; by which people didn’t have doubts that without any idea they are already living near a fault or worst above a fault line with human structures nearby, the next one is poor construction; most of us, Filipinos would tend to be choosing the cheaper one rather the wiser one, most of them would think that “why invest on an expensive one, if you can pick the cheaper one” well, majority of the Filipinos chose the cheaper in a way that they build their house only with the help of a carpenter and such construction worker and without the consent of an engineer or geologist or someone that specialized constructing a building that could stand the test of time. Well, most of the people would tend to build anywhere they wanted to, most especially in Manila and without any idea that they could be affected of such disastrous event, and the worst case, majority of them would tend to be lack of preparedness to what will happen and what to do, in case if the earthquake occurred. Well, being aware on such thing can be based through imagination, if we people would imagine such catastrophic event that would happen we should be prepared, we need to imagine widely, we must not limit our imagination on knowing hazards rather than having only being informed, what if you are informed, and you knew that the disastrous event would only trigger light to moderate, and the next thing happened, the disastrous event triggered much more than the expected one, well think again, predictions are prediction, it could be worsen and it could be lightly, who knows, that is why it is important to imagine with a wide scope. There are some practices that we can do as an action for disaster risk reduction such, we
should know hazards and its risk, and we should monitor and check updates about the situation, and respond properly and timely for preparedness. The valley fault system which was said to have east valley fault that extends up to 10km, while the west valley fault
extends up to 100km,
given such
modernization this day, we can use the given applications and search for the Valley Fault Atlas, which could help where the fault is located. Given from the lecture, I’ve learned that ground shaking would tend to be up and down motion and sideways, primarily this motion could trigger the structures to collapse and produced falling objects unless the building was passed under the circumstances of the government. There were given estimated number of casualties for Metro Manila, the number was incredible high, well, we can reduce that number, if only we would care, aware and prepare for such thing to happen. At the end of this phase, we gathered that, we need to be prepared on such situations that would happen, we need to have at least proper skills so that if time comes, if someone need your help when the situation occurred we could lend some help, and also self-meditate as well, before I end this reaction, we shouldn’t forgot such keys to remember, and prevention to minimize the destruction is a simple way, well I should start those practices by now…
