Tsunami Warning Was Stopped Because of Tourism

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Tsunami Warning Was Stopped Because of Tourism





December 28, 2004

Translated from EXPRESSEN.SE:

Just minutes after the earthquake in the Indian Ocean on Sunday morning, Thailand´s foremost meteorological experts were sitting together in a crisis meeting. But they decided not to warn about the tsunami "out of courtesy to the tourist industry", writes the Thailand daily newspaper The Nation.

The experts got the news around 8:00 am on Sunday morning local time.

An hour later, the first massive wave struck. But the experts started to discuss the economic impacts when they were discussing if a tsunami warning should be made. The main argument against such a warning was that there have not been any floods in 300 years. Also, the experts believed the Indonesian island Sumatra would be a "cushion" for the southern coast of Thailand. The experts also had bad information; they thought the tremor was 8.1. A similar earthquake occurred in the same area in 2002 with no flooding at all.

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