Boosting disaster preparedness

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It is no overstatement to say that preparing for disasters of all sorts and coping with them call for a greater engagement by the government in all respects. The recent incidents of building collapse and fire accidents that demonstrated serious helplessness in clearing the collapsed structures or dousing out the fire, showed up that capacities are significantly lacking to face up to such situations. Bangladesh has otherwise earned a good name for dealing with disasters, internationally. But disaster management operations in this country are still largely limited to battling the situation in post-natural calamities as cyclones. It cannot be said that our abilities for dealing with the destructions of the type noted recently in Dhaka city such as building collapse, fire incident, etc., have similarly improved.
The fire department is spread thin all over the country. The existing strength of fire fighters and their equipment are not sufficient to take on successfully big fire incidents. The available equipment are not particularly capable to reach multi-storied buildings. In the event of an earthquake of the sort that have been predicted for Dhaka causing a series of building collapses, the capacity of the present fire department would be simply overwhelmed. Thus, there is a compelling need to add to the fire fighting capacities of this department. Its regular members need to be increased largely to maintain an appropriate number for discharging duties in Dhaka city and elsewhere.
Furthermore, volunteers in large number need to be raised and drilled well for duty under any disaster situations like earthquakes. Rescue equipment like heavy cranes and other gears are practically none at the disposal of the fire service. The government should aim to get them in adequate number under a time-bound framework and train personnel for operating them quickly and efficiently. In sum, it should beef up its abilities to draw from, in the event of large scale disasters striking specially the urban areas. The preparedness should include both manpower and equipment.
The urban areas like Dhaka are in need of special protection as they hold the major concentrations of wealth or assets in the country. Resources are scarce and, therefore, preparations need to be taken to reduce the impact of disasters and in cases of their happening, to keep losses in different forms as low as possible.
Lubna Islam
Gulshan, Dhaka.