Green Earthquake and Tsunami Alert in Vanuatu
Summary
On 2/2/2012 1:34:39 PM UTC (about 00:43h local time) an earthquake of magnitude 6.9 occurred in the unpopulated region of Vanuatu in Vanuatu. The earthquake happened 117km from Port-Vila. The nearest populated places are: [None]. The closest civilian airport is Port Vila Bauerfield (116km).
It is likely that a tsunami was generated. The maximum tsunami wave height near the coast of Natapao will be 0.49m. Please refer to the GDACS tsunami report for more details.
Potentially affected critical infrastructure:
- Nuclear plants: [None]
- Hydrodams: [None]
- Airports: Port Vila Bauerfield (116km), Quine Hill (131km), Lamap (141km), Sangafa (146km), Emae (154km), Valesdir (158km), Epi (172km), Lamen Bay (176km), South West Bay (156km), Craig Cove (189km)
- Ports: Port Vila (117km), Forari Bay (142km), Port Sandwich (170km)
Based on an automated impact model, this earthquake, which occurred in a region with low vulnerability to natural disasters, has potentially a low humanitarian impact.
Whether international humanitarian aid is needed must be decided by an expert.
| Event Date Univ. Time: | Thu, 2/2/2012 13:34 UTC |
| European Time of the event: | Thu, 2/2/2012 14:34 CET (Brussels, Paris, Rome) |
| East America Time of the event: | Thu, 2/2/2012 08:34 EST (New York, Washington) |
| West America Time of the event: | Thu, 2/2/2012 05:34 PST (San Francisco, Los Angeles) |
| East Asia Time of the event: | Thu, 2/2/2012 22:34 JTI (Tokyo) |
| This email report was automatically created by a computer at: 2/2/2012 1:46:16 PM UTC (11 minutes after the event) | |
See the GDACS website for live news coverage (including OCHA Situation Reports), the full earthquake report and tsunami report .
For information on emergency response, please consult the GDACS Virtual OSOCC.
Tsunami Event
It is likely that a tsunami was generated. Based on precalculated scenarios, the maximum tsunami wave height near the coast of Natapao will be 0.49m.
A detailed tsunami wave height calculation is ongoing and should be available 20 minutes after this report was created. Results can be slightly different than the precalculated scenario. The outcome can be checked here: GDACS tsunami report .
Travel time map.
Other maps: maximum wave height, animation.
Earthquake Event
Characteristics
- Source: World Data Centre for Seismology, Denver (NEIC) M
- Magnitude: 6.9 M
- Depth: 10 km
- Location (Lat/Long): -17.877 | 167.225
- Country: Vanuatu
- Province: Vanuatu
- Region: Vanuatu
- UTC/GMT (Greenwich time): 2/2/2012 1:34:39 PM
- Estimated local solar time: 2/3/2012 12:43:33 AM
Population Density near epicenter (people/km2). Image area: 6x4 decimal degrees (approx. 650x450km2).
Earthquake Impact Details
Potentially affected People
| Population Data | ||
|---|---|---|
| Radius (km) | Population | Density (people/km?) |
| 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 2 | 0 | 0 |
| 5 | 0 | 0 |
| 10 | 0 | 0 |
| 20 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | 0 | 0 |
| 100 | 0 | 0 |
| 200 | 88428 | 0 |
The population in the area of this earthquake is 0 people/km?.
The earthquake occurred at 0h local time. At this time a day, more people are at home and therefore more vulnerable to collapsing residential buildings. During traffic hours, people can be affected by collapsing bridges and other road infrastructure.
Resilience and Vulnerability
Resilience is the capacity of the population to cope with a hazard. Since much of investments in earthquake preparedness and available funds for quick response is related to household income, the GDP per capita can be used as a rough indicator of resilience.
Vanuatu has a GDP per capita of 1347 PPP$ (Parity Purchasing Power Dollar, about 1 Euro) and is therefore part of the low level income countries. Therefore, the earthquake happened in an area of low resilience.
Based on the combination of 9 indicators, ECHO attributes Vanuatu a low vulnerability.
| ECHO Intervention Priority Ranking for Vanuatu | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Overall situation | |
| Human Development | |
| Human Poverty |  |
| Exposure to Major Disasters | |
| Natural Disasters |  |
| Conflicts | |
| Humanitarian effects of population movement | |
| Refugees and IDPs | |
| Health of children under five | |
| Undernourishment | |
| Mortality rates | |
| Other vulnerability factors | |
| Access to health care | |
| Prevalence of HIV, TBC and malaria | |
| Gender-specific Human Development | |
| Gini Index | |
| Source ECHO Key:  Bad - Medium - Good - No data | |
Secondary effects
Probability of secondary effects:
- Landslides: The maximum slope in the area of the earthquake is 0% and the maximum altitude is 25 m. Since this is a low slope, the risk of earthquake induced landslides is low. Note, however, that the slope data is not reliable on a local scale, while landslides depend very much on local topography, soil and meteorological conditions.
- Nuclear power plants: There are no nuclear facilities nearby the epicenter.
- Hydrodams: There are no hydrodam facilities nearby the epicenter.
Disclaimer
While we try everything to ensure accuracy, this information is purely indicative and should not be used for any decision making without alternate sources of information. The JRC is not responsible for any damage or loss resulting from the use of the information presented on this website.
Please refer to the GDACS website for subscribing or unsubscribing from the earthquake alert email or SMS service.
