Tsunami, landslide and flood rehearsals today

A tsunami, landslide and flood rehearsal will be held from 10 am to 3 pm today in selected villages covering eight districts, the Disaster Management Centre said yesterday.

DMC Deputy Director Sarath Lal Kumara said the rehearsal programme will provide guidance to people to seek places of safety and check tsunami early warning systems and also to familiarise residents to react properly in the face of disasters during the drills.

The mock programme conducted together with the Meteorological Department and DMC District units, will process information given by the Met. Dept, provide tsunami alerts and a full tsunami evacuation programme will be put into operation, he said.

The landslide-prone district drills will start at 10 am in Kandy, Nuwara Eliya, Badulla, Matale while flood-prone district drills will start in Ratnapura, Polonnaruwa, Anuradhapura and Kurunegala simultaneously.

Meanwhile, tsunami related drills will be held in 11 districts at 3 p.m. while the activation of tsunami early warning centres including Matara- Devinuwara, Hambantota- Oruwella, Gampaha- Don Bosco, Puttalam-Mahawewa, Colombo- Lunawa, Kalutara- Tangerine, Trincomalee- Nilavely, Ampara- Sinnawarthu, Galle-Telwatte, Jaffna- Point Pedro and Mullaitivu - Pudumathalan.

The Disaster Management Centre requested the public not to panic and to contact the DMC to clarify details regarding the drill. (Chaturanga Pradeep)