Asking which way the sea moved first is such a plain thing to send out after a city has shaken, burned and flooded. I've always pictured the weeks after a disaster like that as sermons and blame, so a government form as the first reflex surprises me. I bet some of those parish replies are the only writing a few villages left from that year.
Portugal answered the 1755 earthquake with a questionnaire, and scientists still use it
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Asking which way the sea moved first is such a plain thing to send out after a city has shaken, burned and flooded. I've always pictured the weeks after a disaster like that as sermons and blame, so a government form as the first reflex surprises me. I be
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After the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, the Marquis of Pombal sent a questionnaire to every parish in Portugal. The questions were strictly factual: when did the shaking begin, how long did it last, did the sea rise or fall first.
The replies are still archived, and modern scientists have used them to reconstruct the quake and the tsunami. It is the reason Pombal is often called a forerunner of modern seismology. The story is told in the standard histories of the earthquake.
What stays with me is the instinct. A capital in ruins, and the first reflex of the government was to ask precise questions before it settled on what the disaster meant.
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Facts first and meaning later is the part most incident reviews get backwards, everyone wants the lesson before the timeline exists. Pombal had a ruined capital and still waited for the timeline.
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Asking which way the sea moved first is such a plain thing to send out after a city has shaken, burned and flooded. I've always pictured the weeks after a disaster like that as sermons and blame, so a government form as the first reflex surprises me. I bet some of those parish replies are the only writing a few villages left from that year.
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After the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, Pombal sent every parish a list of factual questions. Scientists still use the answers.