Aceh's Earthquake & the LYNAS Project

Huh? What's up with this entry? What's the relationship between these two?

Aceh is so far away from the LYNAS project. Aceh is on the tip of Sumatera Island in Indonesia. The LYNAS Project is on the east side of Peninsular Malaysia. These two are separated by the Straits of Malacca & the mighty Titiwangsa range, house of the inactive volcano system.

Aceh has experienced massive earthquakes. Once a 9.1 on Richter scale in 2004, which caused a tsunami that took 220,000 lives. Another one, 8.7 on Richter scale happened just recently.

The coast where the LYNAS plant is safe... calm & steady or so they said.

Yet, the recent earthquake that hit Aceh recently, can also be felt by the east of Peninsular Malaysia... a place that we think is so far away from the earthquake centre.

The people who supports LYNAS Project, a 'rare earth' processing plant say that it is safe. There will be no radiation, no contamination... etc etc... It will be responsibly, carefully & systematically managed. There is no reason for us to be worry.

But, that's what Japan thought of their nuclear plant as well... until the tsunami hit them on the fateful 11-March-2011.

We think, we are safe from natural disaster. We are not in the active volcano range, far from the danger of the tectonic plates. No earthquake, no volcanic activity, minimal possibility of tsunami.

Has this made us cocky? Nature has been kind to us, therefore we want to push it so just we can see how much kinder it can be?

The tremor felt by east of Peninsular Malaysia could become stronger. When it does, is the LYNAS plant prepared for it? Have we not learned from what happened to Japan?

And we are not Japan... I truly admire the courage, strength, discipline, responsibility of the Japanese when faced with adversity. They are like the Phoenix... they can rise from the ashes, stronger.

I do not want to imagine the worst case scenario, but I do hope people who agreed to go forward with the LYNAS project have a plan & a few back up plans when the worst case scenario happened. If not, all of us, the citizens of Malaysia, citizens of the neighbouring countries & citizens of the world will blame the government of Malaysia for not stopping this project, for not listening when Malaysians said we do not want to have a radioactive plant in our country... for being stubborn and for blending this ingredient for disaster into our lives.

You will be owing us so much when the worst case scenario happened because we have told you so!

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