Hyderabad, Mar 13 : The Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS) in Hyderabad has developed a Tsunami Early Warning System to provide special kind of data for the safety of people living in the Indian coastal areas.

The Early Warning System will mitigate Oceanogenic disasters that cause severe threat to nearly 400 million people that live in the coastal belt leading to huge devastation of life and property.

"Tsunami Early Warning System comprises seismic stations. They are actually there to identify whether any Tsunami generic earthquake has happened. So, we are capable of detecting earthquakes of more than six magnitudes because more than six magnitudes are the ones, which are capable of generating a Tsunami. To detect such events, we need a network of seismic stations. So, we have actually access to more than 300 international and national seismic stations, which are sending data to INCOIS," said T. Srinivas Kumar, Incharge, Tsunami Early Warning System.

The centre has a special wing, the National Early Warning System for tsunami and storm surges linked to17 broadband seismic stations for real time earthquake detection and 320 international stations, which enable it to locate its occurrence within five to ten minutes.

"We have used earthquake sensors. So we try to monitor if there is any earthquake happening in the ocean. Once if it has happened, then we see if it is a large one or not because then the displacement of water will be large. Then we monitor water level changes using bottom pressure recorder. If we see any changes in the level of the seawater, we confirm whether Tsunami is likely to come or not," said M. Ravichandran, Head, Modeling and Ocean Observation Group, INCOIS.

The giant tsunami waves that occurred on December 26, 2004 triggered by a powerful earthquake that killed over 150,000 people across Asia and Africa, swept across India''s southeastern and southern coast killing 12,405 people and left millions homeless.

India was among the most grievously hit by the tsunami, with a death toll of more than 7,400 in Tamil Nadu alone.

The coastal districts of Tamil Nadu suffered massive destructions and damage to life and property.

The tsunami swept through Chennai, Cuddalore, Nagapattinam and other coastal belts and thousands of people were washed away. (ANI)