At a recent luncheon at the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Central, business executives, lawyers and journalists mingled while feasting on sole fillet and beef goulash. It was the sort of event at which people do not take themselves - or anything - too seriously. By the time coffee was served, however, the atmosphere had turned gloomy; guest speaker Ian McFeat-Smith had taken to the rostrum to expound on the vulnerability of Hong Kong to a major earthquake.
'I believe we are a big, fat sitting duck,' he told his audience.
The Scottish engineering geologist has recently released a novel that tells the story of a young geologist correctly predicting a big earthquake striking Hong Kong. McFeat-Smith, who is involved in assessing underground projects in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia, believes the real risk of a major earthquake and tsunami hitting the city is far greater than commonly believed and since the city has taken no measures to guard against such a disaster, he considers the risk 'intolerable'.
McFeat-Smith's pessimism resonates with concerns about Hong Kong's seismic vulnerability that emerged locally after a magnitude 9 quake and tsunami ravaged northeast Japan a year ago today. The Tohoku disasters, which began on March 11, killed 15,800 people, damaged or wrecked 125,000 buildings and sparked a nuclear crisis that is ongoing. As soon as the public psyche had absorbed the enormity of the disaster, questions were raised over how at risk Hong Kong was to similar misfortune. Internet forums bristled with concerned posts. One commenter on the popular Golden Forum ventured that Hong Kong would see 'the biggest domino effect in the world' if it were struck by a major quake. As the Fukushima nuclear crisis unfolded, concerns mounted over the Daya Bay nuclear power plant, a mere 20 kilometres from parts of Hong Kong.
Public concern, according to McFeat-Smith, was warranted: 'Risk is not just about likelihood. You must consider the consequences. As Hong Kong is growing, the complexity of our earthquake risk increases,' he said. 'I believe in extreme circumstances, Hong Kong might fail to exist should we experience a large earthquake.'
Earthquake specialists would not go that far, but they do acknowledge that serious damage could be done in a densely populated city with 60,000 high-rises. What's more, the surprising magnitude of the Japan mega-quake has led some scientists at home and abroad to conclude that, if a big quake were to strike the Philippines, there would be a high risk of Hong Kong being hit by a tsunami capable of wiping out houses in Stanley and flooding Tsim Sha Tsui.
'Hong Kong is very prone to tsunamis but it doesn't have any safety measures,' says Wu Tso-ren, a tsunami expert and assistant professor at the National Central University in Taoyuan, Taiwan. 'It should do something as soon as possible to protect itself.'
