Filed under: Events

Disaster preparedness

Intensity

The earthquake and aftershocks we've experienced yesterday inspired me to pen down this disaster preparedness piece. Tuesday Notes would have to wait until next week or so.

While it wasn't as strong and disastrous as Japan's, it still scared the shit out of me. There's a lot we can do to mitigate the damage of any disaster and a lot of these can be done prior to it happening. We take these disasters for granted. I know I do. Until yesterday. So why don't we talk about what we can do to prepare for these disasters.

Digital is good but we need hard copies

I am a proponent of digitization and only recently I wrote a piece last week where I said, "Go digital," we still need to have at least one good old hard copy of important pieces of information. We're talking about a disaster here. Dry cells of our gadgets run out, cell towers bug down and the internet could go haywire. Make sure copies of emergency numbers (start with local police, fire department, nearest hospital, ambulance and the nearest barangay hall) are posted near the house phone, on the fridge and in the car. Keep a copy in your wallet for good measure.

Read the rest of this post »

Never forget: Maguindanao Massacre

On November 21, the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, in cooperation with other media groups, is launching a Blog Action Day in connection with our commemoration of the second anniversary of the November 23, 2009 Ampatuan massacre and the first International Day to End Impunity.

As today, only two Ampatuans have been arraigned. Only 93 of the 196 accused have been arrested. Prosecution and defense lawyers have listed 300 and 320 witnesses, respectively, which, according to Senator Joker Arroyo, a veteran human rights lawyer and courtroom litigator, may take 200 years to present.

Meanwhile, the families of the 58 victims continue to suffer from the loss of their loved ones, most of whom were family breadwinners. Some of the children continue to innocently wait in vain for their murdered parents to come home.

On this day, we would like to invite all of you to use the power of communication and the Internet to speak out for justice and against the continued impunity with which those who wish to suppress freedom of expression impose the ultimate censorship – death – and how the apathy and inaction of government has made this so.

Let this be the start of a meaningful partnership as we forge onward together to realize the full expression of our rights and freedoms as communicators and as citizens of our country.

Below are some links that provide background information on the Ampatuan massacre and current status of the 57 counts of murder filed against the 196 accused:

“End Impunity: NUJP’s countdown to the Ampatuan Massacre’s second Anniversary” on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/End-Impunity-NUJPs-Countdown-to-Ampatuan-Massac...

NUJP (@nujp) on Twitter (http://twitter.com/nujp)

NUJP on Tumblr  which features artworks of children of the victims of the massacre and other media killings. These artworks express how they are coping with the death of their slain parents (http://nujp.tumblr.com/).

Let’s do our share in not forgetting the fallen victims of the Ampatuan Massacre.

 

 

Aircraft carrier-sized asteroid zips past Earth

"Everything shapes its course," Datowitz told FoxNews.com, even the Earth and moon that asteroid 2005 YU55 breezed past at 6:28 p.m. EST Tuesday, Nov. 8. At that point, the space rock was traveling at about 29,000 mph ... a whopping 8 miles per second. 

The asteroid has travelled light years to reach us, on a trajectory affected by planets, asteroids, space dust and more. Tonight it was a mere 201,700 miles from Earth -- closer than the moon at one point.

What if the tug of gravity from a planet in a galaxy far, far away had been slightly stronger? What if the course of asteroid 2005 YU55 had been altered by a tiny amount, a few micrometers -- micrometers that added up over the course of millions of light years?

Indeed, even the effect of light is enough to alter the path of an asteroid.

Indeed. What if? Life as we know it could have ended early this morning.

It makes you think long and hard that everything we know, we see, hear, feel, touch, obsess, love, it could all disappear easily. Just like an on-and-off switch.

§

Ppip Cimafranca

Ppip Cimafranca

I look forward to the day when all I need to make things happen is a mobile device, the cloud, some rock music and a foul mouth.