Besides floods, Ghana has been spared the natural disasters which are features of some parts of the world.
The earth tremors which hit some parts of the city a couple of days ago surprised many because, such occurrences rarely take place.
For some, it was the brief rumbling noise of a big truck driving in the neighbourhood only realising later that it was an earth tremor.
As for earth quakes, Ghana has not witnessed any in living memory, the last being in 1939 in Accra, with its destructive fallouts recorded in the annals of natural disasters. Part of the Central Police Station in Accra Central and the Ministries’ area recorded cracks on the buildings, archival records indicate.
Even yesterday, some residents said they felt another tremor and be it as it may, it would appear that a seismologist’s prediction that the near rampant occurrence is an indication that a full-scale earth quake is en route to Accra, something which should be taken seriously.
In a country where safety procedures are not known because they rarely happen, there is the need to educate the citizenry in the quake zones on what to do when they occur.
We have been told about how some persons, out of fright, started running out of their offices which while it was the best thing to do, under the circumstances, the Director General of the Ghana Geological Survey Authority Isaac Mwinbelle, has offered valuable lessons.
The taking cover under tables and proceeding to the ground floors including the steering away from beneath bridges are precautionary measures we have never known until the expert’s advice following the recent tremors.
It is interesting and instructive to learn that as a result of heightened human activities, such as erection of structures, there have been disturbances of the existing fault lines in the earth’s crust in some parts of Accra, where seismological movements are likely to take place.
The GSA should educate us more about seismological movements and the necessary precautions especially, where it is unsafe to build certain class of structures.
When an earth tremor occurred in 2020, experts spoke about the need to avoid building along the seismic line but the admonition evaporated into thin air. Nobody believed there could be any such seismic occurrence that could cause any harm.
Estate developers and others putting up structures along the seismic line in Accra should be mindful about the consequences and acquire earthquake arresters.
Some parts of Accra fall within the seismic zone and so future earth quakes cannot be ruled out along this line hence the importance of listening to the experts.