Move to modernise lone seismic centre

Seismographs used to measure earthquake are seen in the seismic observatory centre at Ambagan. PHOTO: STAR

The renovation of the lone observatory centre at Ambagan area in the city will start soon, said Mohammed Momenul Islam, a meteorologist at the centre.

The seismic observatory centre in Chittagong has been functioning manually since its installation in 1954.

When any earthquake occurs, the seismologists in the centre manually calculate its duration, distance and magnitude through analysis of responses from the seismographer and the seismometer installed there.

In absence of sufficient number of observatories, it could not be possible to identify the direction of the epicentre so far, said Samsuddin Ahmed, a meteorologist of Meteorology and Geo-Physical Centre at Agrabad. He said with a single observatory centre, it is not possible to identify the epicentre of the earthquake.

Meanwhile, construction of three other seismic observatories in Dhaka, Sylhet and Rangpur is going on in full swing.

It needs at least three centres to find out the accurate location of the epicentre of any earthquake, sources said.

After completion of the construction and installations of equipment in the new centres in Dhaka, Sylhet and Rangpur as well as modernisation of Ambagan centre, all the four will work under a single network, sources said.

If earthquake occurs, all the data from three other centres would be sent to Dhaka for analysis.

The analysis of the data will help find out the accurate magnitude, duration and the epicentre of any earthquake, they said.

The newly built centres with computerised seismic system will help us find records and seismic data easily to provide information required for building construction, urban planning and mining purpose, said Shamsuddin.

Analysis of the previous records showed that with the country situated on the Indo-Australian Plate, many of its areas in Sylhet and Chittagong are in the high-risk zone of earthquake.

As the earthquake can not be forecast, sufficient data and records available from the four observatory centres will surely help the people of the high risk areas to take necessary precaution to avert destruction due to earthquake, they said.

A total of nine earthquakes were recorded in the observatory in Chittagong this year. Of them, one with the highest magnitude of 5.9 on Richter scale was recorded on February 14. It had its epicentre some 619 kilometres off the observatory centre in the port city, sources at the observatory centre said.

The Chittagong Seismic Observatory started its journey in the Met Office at Patenga in 1954. Later, it was shifted to Zakir Hossain Road at Nasirabad in 1957 before the final shifting at its present location at Ambagan, around 35 metres above the sea level in 1961, said the sources.