St Kitts conducts tsunami readiness drill

Kingston, Jamaica — The National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) in St Kitts and Nevis says it is making preparations to test the readiness of public and private sector entities, in the event of a tsunami in the Caribbean islands.

According to a report out of St Kitts, the Tsunami Exercise scheduled for Wednesday (March 26) is important because the region sits on the rim of two major tectonic plates and most settlements on the islands are located in coastal areas, some even at or below sea level.

The report from the St Kitts and Nevis Information Service said that UNESCO and the International Intergovernmental Commission (IIC) have decided to broaden the tsunami readiness to all countries, including territories in the Caribbean and is leading the charge on this exercise in this hemisphere.

“To date over 100,000 different entities and agencies have signed on to participate in this exercise in this hemisphere” Tsunami Exercise coordinator Ivor Blake said in the report.

“In St Kitts and Nevis the exercise will be conducted as a table top exercise and will test the response of the disaster management responders in the Federation. The aim in our case is to test the communication aspect of disaster readiness in our state and how information is received, used and disseminated.”

A tsunami is a series of high waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, generally resulting from an earthquakes or volcanic activity.