False alarm

Well, as I'm sure you're all well aware by now, the tsunami alert that flashed through our village (and across the whole of Sri Lanka from what was coming across the local airwaves) was in fact a false alarm. While that is of course a very fortunate thing - though not so fortunate for the thousand or so Indonesians who lost their lives in the initial earth quake measuring 8.7 on the richter scale, just .3 less than the December 26 eartyhquake that caused the tsunami - I do worry about the lack of information that was available for up to 3 hours after this most recent earthquake. Surely it should be known within that time whether a tsunami had resulted or not, and that information should be broadcast out to everyone in the various areas so as to avoid widespread panic that could in turn claim victims itself?

Instead, we got local radio stations and even international websites with no new information until hours after the initial earthquake, and local people understandably scared and in many cases running for high ground.