By Ephraim Aguilar, A15 (Southern Luzon page)
Legazpi City
FOR THE FIRST TIME in almost a year, the state-run weather station in Legazpi City had its Internet connected, but an employee had to step up to pay for it with her personal money.
The phone line itself was about to be disconnected due to unpaid bills. When the station was called for updates, the phone line was connected, but the call was mysteriously cut off mid-conversation.
The employee being interviewed was just stating that the phone line was cut off last weekend. She was about to say how they fixed the problem when the call was cut short. Attempts to call back were met with a busy tone.
Similarly, the land line of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) observatory in Daraga town has been inaccessible for the past months.
Dream
A wireless telephone occasionally works, but an employee said more often than not, it is disconnected.
Attempted calls are met with a machine-recorded female voice stating, “The subscriber you dialed is powered off.”
Considering the unstable phone line, the observatory staff can only dream of having a fax machine connected for easier distribution of volcanic and earthquake bulletins to those that need these pieces of vital information.
Both disaster agencies lack not only proper communication facilities but equipment crucial in lessening the impact of calamities.
Albay is prone to typhoons, floods, “lahar,” volcanic eruption and earthquakes.
In January, the Department of Science and Technology installed an upper-air receiving equipment worth P18 million but this has not been in use, said Corazon Samar, chief meteorological officer of Pagasa-Legazpi.
She said it was due to the lack of transmitters.
The transmitter of the upper-air receiving equipment is a small device attached to a big balloon, which could be launched into the air daily to gather real-time information from an altitude of up to 12 kilometers.
At least one transmitter could be launched every day and four during typhoons at a cost of P30,000 for every launch.
Samar said the station’s microbarograph is under repair while the aerovane is malfunctioning.
The microbarograph reads barometric pressure in real time while the aerovane determines wind direction and speed.
Samar said the station now only relies on a barometer which, unlike the microbarograph, has to be read hourly to get results.
Pagasa-Legazpi lacks personnel. Samar said it has only six employees and three security guards.
It also works with a monthly subsidy for operational expenses of only P1,995, excluding water, power and communication expenses.
Samar said her office always receives notices of disconnection due to unpaid bills because of the delay in processing payments from the central office.
Eduardo Laguerta, senior science research specialist of Phivolcs-Bicol, said the lack of seismic sensors around Mt. Mayon makes it hard to locate volcanic earthquakes.
He said since the government has limited resources, most equipment installed for Phivolcs-Bicol were funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency.
“There are only three stations bearing sensors around Mt. Mayon. If just one of these sensors does not function well, our monitoring will be greatly affected,” he said.
The location of volcanic earthquakes is important in determining signs of magma ascent inside the volcano. The lack of sensors, Laguerta said, makes it impossible to detect low-frequency earthquakes.
He said more sensors would make their findings on volcanic and seismic activities more refined.
Laguerta said there had been cases when villagers living near vital installations would steal station batteries, steel and phone lines.
He said that in places like Hawaii, there are more than enough sensors and other equipment, but people do not pilfer them.
“Here in our country, before you can even turn your back, the equipment is gone,” he said.
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