Anguilla was among the lucky islands in the Caribbean to have been spared the ravages of the 2007 hurricane season which officially ended on November 30 and, unfortunately, one has not really heard much thanksgiving here that none of the storms came our way.

It was just the day before the end of the hurricane season that Anguilla and many other islands in the region were jolted by a powerful earthquake which, with a magnitude of 7.4, could have wreaked a lot of destruction elsewhere in the world. At the same time the probable reason our region got off basically lightly may have been due to the depth of the epicentre of the earthquake and the fact that our islands are scattered across the Caribbean.

It is also a lucky thing that, as some people feared, there was no tsunami resulting from the quake to flood our coastlines and populated areas. There seems to be reason for concern as there is reportedly a fault in this region where the South American and the Caribbean Tectonic plates push against each other below the Lesser Antilles arc near Martinique. This region must therefore be on the alert for possible earthquakes however infrequently they occur.

So with the end of the hurricane season, we experienced another extreme in the line of natural disasters which can occur when we least expect. There are lingering terrifying memories of the earthquake among many people in Anguilla and the rest of the affected region. The problems with earthquakes are the suddenness of their occurrence without warning and the total destruction they can cause to unsuspecting and unprepared victims and their properties. When the earthquake struck people instinctively ran from their places of work or homes into the open environment where they felt safer while enduring the shaking of the earth, but there is a need for a set of guidelines here in Anguilla (not forgetting elsewhere) as to what persons should do when an earthquake occurs.

This is something that the Disaster Preparedness Department in Anguilla must take up with some haste. Earthquakes may be rare in this part of the world, but there is certainly a need for preparation. We have been focussing for many years on preparedness as it relates to hurricanes, but we must now take a broader view about natural disasters on a whole and what we need to know about them and do when they strike.

Be prepared must be our rallying cry.

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