The Indian Ocean is now expected to become a major center of focus for scientists studying underwater earthquakes and tsunamis caused by them.

Experts will now have raw data to create an earthquake-tsunami model for the Indian Ocean, a region not known for this powerful natural disturbance. “Here is something that we didn’t foresee. We’re going to have a

much better idea of the hazard is because right now we don’t know,” Dr. Costas E. Synolakis was quoted by The New York Times as saying.

The first magnitude 9.0 earthquake in 40 years and its aftermath are expected to help scientists create computer models that would give a better handle on similar events in the future.

A similar magnitude earthquake arose out of the Cascadia fault in the Pacific Northwest in the year 1700 unleashing a comparable wave of tsunamis.

Scientists say that the 600-mile Cascadia fault has been quiet for a long time now and there is no telling when it might repeat.

Australian seismologist Phil Cummins, who has been expressing concern about tsunamis in the Indian Ocean, concluded last year that such an event was indeed possible.

Cummins had been making presentations about this possibility in Japan and Hawaii, two centers that have tracked tsunamis for a long time.

(Compiled from news dispatches by M. Chooki)