Global Earthquake Safety Initiative (GESI): pilot project

ABSTRACT

As the Global Earthquake Safety Initiative (GESI) Pilot Project was drawing to a close, the world witnessed two earthquake disasters, striking countries on opposite sides of the earth India and El Salvador. At this writing, the final human and economic toll is not known, but it can be assumed that tens of thousands of lives and billions of dollars were lost. For El Salvador, emerging from decades of civil war and with half its population below the poverty line, the losses were devastating­0.02% of its population and 10% of its GDP, equivalent to losses for the more populous, richer U.S. of 55,000 lives and $900 billion. And the toll cannot be measured in lives and dollars alone. The entire world shuddered at images of Indian children crushed while sitting at their school desks or while marching in a holiday parade. Learning of such disasters is especially distressing for people like the authors of this report, who are familiar with earthquake risk. As it is for everyone, it is painful for us to see the suffering of already impoverished people and innocent children. It is even worse because for us these disasters are no surprise and they teach us nothing new. Studies of earthquake disasters always reach the same conclusions: communities should enact and enforce modern building and land-use codes, strengthen and prepare medical care facilities, and train and equip emergency response agencies. These earthquake disasters are also depressing because for a fraction of the reconstruction costs, the losses could have been reduced or even avoided through mitigation and preparedness beforehand. Finally, these disasters disturb us because they absorb the world's attention, allowing little attention to be given to the hundreds of communities that are as vulnerable as those just struck. Thus, while we mourn the Indian and Salvadoran victims and sympathize with the survivors, our energies are directed to avoiding such disasters elsewhere in the future. We wish to alert threatened cities of their danger and help them reduce their future death and suffering. This is the mission of GeoHazards International (GHI) and the focus of the GESI Pilot Project.