Communities of Florida in Colombia Installed Warning System for Possible Galeras Volcano Eruption

Communities of Florida in Colombia Installed Warning System for Possible Galeras Volcano Eruption

In the vicinity of the city of Pasto in south-western Colombia, there has been one of currently the most active volcanoes since the 16th century. After a relatively short dormant period, the Galeras volcano started a series of seismic eruptions that have marked the history in the Department of Nariño since the 1930s with numbers of victims and casualties. Interestingly, even during the Decade Volcano Conference in the city of Pasto in 1993, a sudden, unexpected eruption occurred, ending in a disaster and killing nine people.

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Not only have the local authorities taken on the task of monitoring the volcanic behaviour and thoroughly studying the acquired information, but also of raising awareness and preparing the community to face a potential emergency in the best possible way to protect the population. In mid-2018, they installed an alert system of electronic sirens to warn the local population.

The Gibon and Bono sirens were installed as part of a pilot project. The sirens generate alarm tones; however, they also inform the population of what is happening and provide instructions. The authorities can activate the installed siren system locally or remotely via VHF radio, allowing timely warning so that families can take action and prevent tragedies in the event of a disaster.

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History has shown that it is not enough to study natural phenomena in order to predict a catastrophic event and to educate the population. A fundamental part of the process is a system that allows mass notification of the people when the devices in the system can detect the imminence of any catastrophe: the system that delivers the information from the authorities to the community – the system of electronic sirens made by Telegrafia. These measures altogether lead to the better management and mitigation of negative impacts of natural disasters.

rychtarcikova

The article was written by

Petra Rychtarcikova

Petra is an international business manager in charge of Spanish, French and Portuguese-speaking countries. Petra, with her global, economic and logistic background and knowledge of four languages, does very productive and responsible work for Telegrafia. Latin-American affairs, travelling, tourism and electronic sirens are her hobbies, and she is pleased to bring you exciting information from the Telegrafia world.

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