Smith Dharmasaroja ( th, สมิทธ ธรรมสโรช; ; 6 November 1937) is a Thai government official. In 1998, while serving as a

meteorologist A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists in research, while th ...

, he predicted that an

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

and

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...

"is going to occur for sure."Southeast Asian Press Alliance ‘Mad’ Scientist Gets Belated Recognition
He advocated tsunami warning systems, but was not taken seriously. After the tsunami of December 2004, which killed over 200,000 people, he was recalled from retirement and charged with development of Thai and regional warning systems. As chief of the National Disaster Warning Centre in Thailand, Dharmasaroja publicly stated that a

solar eclipse A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes between Earth and the Sun, thereby obscuring the view of the Sun from a small part of the Earth, totally or partially. Such an alignment occurs during an eclipse season, approximately every six mo ...

could trigger natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis in Thailand, depending on "the time that the sun unleashed its energy."

References

Living people Thai meteorologists 1937 births Smith Dharmasaroja {{Thailand-bio-stub