I was just reading that someone in the federal government made a statement about why the Canadian military DART team was put on hold.

“Anyone who claims to have known at the time of the first few days of the breadth of the situation is not being truthful,” an official with the Canadian International Development Agency said.

Hello. This official is not idenifying themself, are they? Quelle surprise.
Go back to your corner office or cube farm madam or mr. official. I find statements like that and the mentality that goes with it, infuriating.

I understand government is unwieldy. I understand blame is going to be passed around various government departments. But thinking a 8.9 (upgraded to a 9)quake and resulting tsunamis weren’t a big enough deal to wait for more information before making a decision is…is…grrrr. A couple of days may have made a major difference in many lives.

The internet and and Short Message Service played an unprecented role in assisting people.

Land lines went down and cellphone service was partly crippled. But Short Message Service technology, known as SMS, allowed text messages to be sent. Within minutes of the first tsunami, SMS communications were flashing out of the region.

In Sri Lanka, Sanjaya Senanayake, a 23-year-old television producer, raced to the beach to warn a friend when he heard a tsunami had hit on another coast. He watched a wave wash across a railway line and wipe out a slum, and sent an SMS to a friend in Bombay, India, who began posting his messages on a weblog, or blog.

“The Holy Family Convent, children’s home and school are completely destroyed. Debris covers the entire compound and the stench of rotting flesh is everywhere. There are obviously bodies under the rubble. There’s no one to remove them. Mother Superior Ambrosine covers her nose as she tries to salvage what she can,” says one of his brief messages.

People used SMS to reassure family members and to find out who survived, who was missing and where to seek refuge.

As the scope of loss unfolded, those with internet connections did more.

Within days of the tsunami disaster, people were posting Internet blogs.

“Sri Lanka has changed geographically, the land having caved in from the South and the East. We’re no longer a pearl, or a pear, or a tear drop. We’re a drowning blob in the Indian Ocean,” a 16-year-old girl named Subha said on the blog Chiens Sans Frontiers, or Dogs Without Borders.

“Just how quickly people mobilized on-line has been remarkable,” said Rick Broadhead, a Canadian technology and Internet expert.

“It’s hard to imagine people getting through this without the Internet.”