Portugal participated, through the National Civil Protection Authority (ANPC) and the Portuguese Institute of the Sea and the Atmosphere (IPMA), in an international exercise to test the capacity to respond to a tsunami likely to affect our coastline.
The exercise, called NEAMWave14, which took place between 28 and 30 October, provided for four possible scenarios for the occurrence of a tsunami.
In addition to Portugal, another 20 countries from the Mediterranean and North Atlantic basin took part: Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, Malta, Monaco, Morocco, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain , Sweden, Turkey and the United Kingdom.
The objective of the exercise was to test the responsiveness of the participants who are part of the Early Warning System for the Northeast Atlantic, Mediterranean and related seas, constituted under the aegis of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC).
The IPMA acted as an Alert Center for the national civil protection system and for the authorities of the countries of the North-East Atlantic, having carried out the detection and monitoring of the evolution of the scenario of a tsunami generated by a seismic event originating in the southwest of Cape de Saint Vincent.
ANPC, which involved its entire operational structure in this exercise, disseminated technical and operational information relevant to the management of protection and relief operations and assessed the capacity of the implemented warning and alert system to respond to this type of emergency situation, involving the three operational levels that compete for this purpose: national, district and municipal.
In the end, the exercise made it possible to assess the reliability of the solutions implemented by the two institutions in relation to tsunami warnings, allowing the competent national authorities to improve their degree of preparedness to respond to this type of danger.
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