Earthquake Persuasive Essay

Funding Debate

The government has been at odds when it comes to funding for volcano and earthquake monitoring. Some say that the governments money should go towards other things. Others oppose to the lack of funding. In the interest of saving lives volcano and earthquake monitoring is essential for the safety of people near volcanoes, or living on fault lines. If people are unaware of the danger they might be in, evacuations will be nearly impossible. If the earthquake or volcano is highly destructive, hundreds upon thousands of people could die.

Earthquakes are one of the most destructive natural disasters on Earth. Several accounts have been reported of powerful earthquakes killing hundreds, and injuring thousands. Monitoring and predicting

Each one has the potential to be extremely destructive. Without funding, volcanologist will not be able to predict volcanic eruptions, which could possibly cost thousands upon millions of lives. Lives will not only be spent however, eruptions such as Mount St. Helens cost around 1.1 billion dollars for repairs. These aftermath costs could be way more damaging to the governments wallet than funding to predict volcanic eruptions. Earthquakes are another problem entirely. California itself is on a dangerous faultline and many earthquakes have occured along this fault line including the Great 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, which resulted in around 3,000 deaths. This area should be especially monitored not all states should receive funding for earthquakes because not all states need it. Unlike volcanoes, fault lines don’t go dormant which is why monitoring fault lines is essential. Rebuilding costs for earthquakes can potentially go as high as 232 billion dollars, which is another kick in the governments wallet due to lack of funding for earthquake proof buildings. On the other hand, earthquake monitors specialized in detecting even the smallest of quakes could be distributed with only around 30 million dollars statewide. That equipment alone has the power to aid seismologists in predicting earthquakes. In the end, funding for earthquake monitoring will cost money, but it will not only saves lives, but it will save the government from spending billions of dollars on one repair whereas funding will go to several states in need of such