Commentary
By Kaushal Kishore*
Last Saturday when we were celebrating Makar Sankranti in India, a series of volcanic eruption occurred in the Pacific Ocean. It disconnected more than a hundred thousand Polynesian people of Tonga from rest of the world. The volcanic eruption created lack of real time information related to situation on ground even in this age of information technology.
In the south Pacific region, the Hunga Tonga – Hunga-Ha’apai volcanoes have been active for a long time. But the explosion had never been so terrible in the past. The big bang was heard thousands of miles away as far as Alaska in the United States of America. Power supply in Tonga was cut off, and the communication system like phones and internet went off. As such all connections with modern technology were severed. Five days later, when limited facilities were restored, the Tongan government noted unusually heavy damage on the three islands including death of four people. Apart from that the two casualties are reported from Peru.
Tonga faced waves up to 1.2 meters high on some of its islands. The volcanic ash falling from the sky made breathing a difficult experience. It has also contaminated most of the water resources, and the black layer of ash has spread over the island nation. The mystery behind this series of events is yet to be known, however, an earthquake of 5.8 magnitude was recorded by the American Geological Survey. The authority in New Zealand has expressed the possibility of its repetition.
Also read: Tsunami warnings in Tonga make nations edgy
After the newest series of eruption the tsunami warning was issued in certain countries like New Zealand, Fiji, Peru, Australia, Japan, Chile and America, as a precaution. This volcanic eruption seems to disturb the entire Pacific region. It caused irreparable damage to aquatic ecosystems, and the loss of biodiversity is not limited to the sea. The accounts of oil spill in Peru, 10000 kilometres away from its actual site, can be helpful to imagine the scale of destruction. The largest refinery in Peru sustained the accident due to the destructive waves of the tsunami. The dead bodies of a number of living organisms are scattered across an area of 18000 square kilometers.
The Ring of Fire in the Pacific Ocean is 40000 kilometres long and 500 kilometres wide. The shape of this vast area is like a horseshoe, and it has witnessed the two-thirds of all volcanoes in the world history. Polynesian country Tonga is a part of this region located in South Pacific, its total 169 islands spread over 750 square kilometres. The population of about a hundred thousand people live on its 36 islands. Hunga-Tonga and Hunga-Ha’apai, located 65 kilometres apart from Tongan capital Nuku’alofa, used to be two different islands before merging in 2009 due to the volcanic eruption. Again the same started burning on December 20, 2021 that continued till January 5, 2022. After this horrific eruption that sent a plume of ash, gas and steam 17 kilometres into the atmosphere last Saturday, the two islands have been separated again. But the two are now reduced considerably, and the same mass of land returned to the earth after touching the sky as a rain of stones on Tonga tapu.
Today the wrath of nature is in discussion due to this series of destruction. As such the humankind has paved the way for this planet to move towards the sixth extinction of biodiversities. The experts observed that in the last five centuries possibly as many as 150,000–260,000 of the two million species have already gone extinct. This huge loss of biodiversity will be the first such event to be caused by humans.
One of the episodes of Angry Planet, the audio visual series by the storm chaser George Kourounis, deal with sensitivity of this region. The volcanic eruption and destructive waves of the tsunami are natural calamities, but the civilisation based on modern technology helped them to be more lethal.
The developed nations extend a helping hand after this kind of calamities in the name of service to humanity. Countries in the Pacific region such as New Zealand, America, Australia and Japan have extended their helping hand to the people of Tonga. But no effort has been made keeping in mind the loss of animals and plants. In such a situation, is it possible that nature will help them in the future?
*Kaushal Kishore is the author of The Holy Ganga (Rupa, 2008) and Managing Editor of Panchayat Sandesh, a monthly organ of All India Panchayat Parishad. The views expressed as personal.
