By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, June 9, 2017 : Come the next independence day, Odisha can warn the vast population residing along its 480 km-long coast by pressing a single button from a control room in the State capital in the event of the occurrence of natural disasters like a tsunami or a cyclone.

The State government is likely to commission the ambitious Early Warning Dissemination System (EWDS) that would enable loud sirens go off simultaneously from towers at 122 locations by August 15.

Presiding over a high level meeting of officials, chief secretary A P Padhi on Friday directed the officials of the Revenue and Disaster Management department to ensure installation of the EWDS by August 15.

Odisha is the first State in India to have developed an automatic public address system that can be activated along its entire coast.

The system would enable people living within 2 km area from the coast to hear siren much earlier when the calamity hits the land, special relief commissioner (SRC) B P Sethi.

“The sound emanating from the towers can be heard in localities up to a radius of 1.5 km. As many as 122 alert towers have already been constructed. The project is nearing completion”, Sethi added.

Under the ambitious project, the State Disaster Management Centre (SDMC) will be synced up with 161 towers out of which six towers will be set up at the district level, 22 towers at Block level, 14 in fishing jetties and 122 siren towers spread over 22 coastal blocks while six digital mobile radio stations will also be fitted with the system, the SRC said.

The new system will also enable authorities to alert people in smaller pockets, depending on the severity of the disaster.

Though the meteorological prediction has improved considerably and authorities handling disasters are able to know the intensity of cyclones two to three days in advance, there is no system to alert people instantly if the tsunami alert is to be disseminated in the dead of the night?

Officials said the siren alert system would come handy in such cases. People would start moving to safer places before government agencies commenced evacuation, he added. The protocol, which will be developed in due course of time, will help people understand the gravity of situation depending on the number of sirens that would go off from towers.

The EWDS comprises of technologies like Satellite-Based Mobile Data Voice Terminals (SBMDVT), Digital Mobile Radio (DMR), Mass Messaging System (MMS) and Universal Communication Interface (UCI) for inter-operability among different communication technologies.

The project is being executed by L&T and costs Rs 75.09 crore out of which the World Bank will provide Rs 66.77 crore, while the state government will spend the remaining Rs 8.32 crore.