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Straits Times, 10 Jan 05 Did animals sense approaching disaster? by Nirmal Ghosh BANGKOK - STORIES of wildlife sensing the approach of the tsunamis and fleeing to safer ground are prompting scientists to take a closer look at the instinctual bonds that enable animals to feel the pulse of nature. But because hard data on animal behaviour is still scarce, most scientists prefer to rely on expensive technology to sense earthquakes and tsunamis while seeking other explanations for the behaviour of birds and animals. In Sri Lanka's Yala National Park, located on its eastern coast, the Dec 26 tsunamis took the lives of scores of tourists. But the wildlife suffered almost no casualties. The elephants, wild boar, deer, monkeys and others had moved inland to avoid the killer waves. Another example is from Thailand's ravaged Phang Nga province, where 4,000 lives were lost. A group of elephants kept by a resort at Khao Lak to give rides to tourists began wailing when the undersea earthquake first shook Sumatra. They calmed down after a few minutes but began wailing again later, just minutes before the tsunamis arrived. They then headed for high ground, some with tourists still on their backs. Others broke their strong chains to follow. All were saved - along with their keepers and the tourists. To Indian elephant expert D K Lahiri Choudhury, that was not surprising. 'I have seen elephants sensing a coming earthquake much earlier than humans,' he said in an e-mail to The Straits Times. He recalled an experience in the early 1950s when he was riding an elephant in a wildlife sanctuary in Assam when an earthquake struck. 'The elephants started shivering and trumpeting. We were lucky to be able to scramble off our mounts and were on ground, but still did not feel anything. 'Suddenly, birds took to the air all together, twittering. The elephants just huddled together and went on trumpeting. And slowly we could feel the tremor on the ground.' There has always been anecdotal evidence of birds and animals sensing earthquakes. In the 6.8-point Uttaranchal earthquake in northern India in 1991, villagers said dogs had begun to howl in unison minutes before the earthquake struck. On an Internet bulletin board, a survivor from Phuket wrote about seeing dogs running inland minutes before the tsunami struck. In the frequent aftershocks that followed the lethal 7.9-point earthquake of 2001 in the Kutch region of India, in which 35,000 people died, peacocks and crows showed signs of agitation. They often took to the air with nervous cries in the middle of the night. The Indian authorities have reported that the indigenous, stone-age tribes of the Andaman and Nicobar islands escaped the effects of the tsunami because they heeded warning signals from birds and animals. But the scientific world has largely associated these episodes, compelling as they are, to factors other than a 'sixth sense'. Scientists argue that elephants have the ability to detect low frequency sounds well below the range of human hearing. It is possible, they say, that they would 'hear' or 'feel' the vibration of a distant powerful earthquake. But no definitive evidence exists, they say, that can warrant abandoning technology like undersea pressure sensors to warn people of quakes and tsunamis. However, not all share this scepticism. In an e-mail to a conservation group on Dec 4, Indian academic Arunachalam Kumar made the observation that a major earthquake could occur very soon. Under the subject Whale Suicides And Earthquakes, Dr Kumar wrote: 'It is my observation that mass suicides of whales and dolphins that occur sporadically all over the world are, in some way, related to change and disturbances in the electromagnetic field coordinates and possible re-alignments of geotectonic plates thereof. 'Tracking the dates and plotting the locales of tremors and earthquakes, I am reasonably certain that major earthquakes usually follow within a week or two of mass breaching of cetaceans. I have noted with alarm the report last week of such mass deaths of marine mammals at an Australian beach. I will not be surprised if within a few days a massive quake hits some part of the globe.' (Cetaceans are marine mammals). 'The inter-relationship between the unusual 'death-wish' of pods of whales and its inevitable aftermath, the earthquake, may need a further impassioned and unbiased looking into.' Twenty-two days later, the magnitude 9 earthquake off Aceh triggered the underwater pressure wave that is now known as the Boxing Day Tsunami, which killed more than 150,000 people - but few animals. Later, Dr Kumar, a professor in a medical college in Mangalore, said of the link: 'It's not something I have proved scientifically... but it would be interesting if someone followed it up. 'If someone were to compare dates for the last 10 major earthquakes and whale stranding, they will find a link. 'Whales and dolphins migrate thousands of miles along the geomagnetic wave, using it to align themselves. If they're beaching, it means their direction-finding capacity has gone wrong, perhaps due to seismic activity.' links Related articles on Tsunami and the environment |
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