Malditah Musings

Danger In The Pacific: The Samoa Tsunami

With the help of my colleague, Alex Molina, I recently wrote about the realistic dangers posed tsunamis west coast of the United States.
I vastly underestimated the damage a tsunami can do, and the last two days, after reading about the 8.3 magnitude earthquake and tsunami that followed, I also got to watch the Pacific Ocean tsunami warning system's action.

In the case of Samoa, American Samoa, and Tonga, epicenter of earthquakes and aftershocks are in some cases less than 100 miles from the coastlines. This meant that the system is some early time to warn anyone. At this time, over 111 people are reported missing or dead from the three Pacific territories, and count that is expected to be considerably higher when emergency personnel make it difficult to access, remote areas. In some cases, the wave comes as a mile inland.

From reports from wire services and the people I talked to the American Samoa, The only immediate tsunami warning for most people received cell phone calls made by forward-thinking family. Common sense dictated that if the an earthquake are both close enough and strong enough to damage buildings, a tsunami is on its way. While many villages were literally swept completely in the Pacific Ocean, most people managed to get to high ground and escaped with their lives.

In the future, these three areas, especially in American Samoa, because it is under the jurisdiction of FEMA and the U.S. Government, have to improve their tsunami warning system up to the high standards set by the state of Oregon, which includes all blue sirens along the coast, and regularly scheduled tsunami drills in all public schools.

Now for good news
If not, the new system in the Pacific seems to be working properly. In all fairness, the tsunami hit a true American Samoa point-blank shot and we do not have the benefit of buoys to warn us of what's coming. When the tsunami has had time to move out and start hitting buoys, however, we had a clear picture of when the waves hit Hawaii, Japan, the west coast of the United States, and other Pacific areas at risk.

Warnings are made well in advance, and ships may seek deeper, safer water, tsunami watches and warnings that went into effect, and quickly out of the effect, once to know the wave NOAA has lost considerable power and size, and represented little threat.

Even from afar, Venice Beach, California, lifeguards advised people to get out of the water in advance of the wave, and the tsunami showed up right on time. Apparently there was not much punch left, but I am sure the state of California is relieved. Still, the unfortunate and low-lying town of Crescent City, California was battered by a 1.5 foot peak over normal tides - a size comparable to the biggest wave to hit Hawaii after the earthquake. State officials, knows weaknesses of the people on tsunamis, are able to take the right precautions, however, and other than a fear of local fish, no one is damaged and no damage to property was reported.

Coating this perspective
As we talk, a much deadlier events have time left over 300 dead and thousands homeless, such as Cyclone Ketsana was slammed in the Philippines, Vietnam and Cambodia. As much as 80% of Manila was saturated. The second earthquake hit Indonesia today, a magnitude 7.6 earthquake, scaring everyone up in the hills. Is considered A 8.0 earthquake in the same place that prompted the 2004 tsunami of infamy, I'm not saying they overreacted. If I felt a strong earthquake on any coastline, would I hightail it at least a mile in the hills as well.
The tsunami that resulted from it is less that a foot, smaller than what hit Hawaii or the Crescent City California earthquakes from Samoa. Officials may call off the warning and people soon returned to their normal lives.

In the world of extreme events time, we can still only guess exactly what the storm was a do or where it will go. This is true of many weather events, be they floods, tornadoes, even a huge fire. Earthquake was the worst of all, and give no warning, but unless you are near the epicenter, tsunamis are at least in the Pacific predictable, thanks to the work of U.S. and Japanese governments.

At this point in time, we are target = "_blank"> Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, (which is also where the fancy map is from) headquartered in Hawaii, who watches all tidal buoys in the Pacific Ocean all the time and gives us a very clear picture of what is going on out there. While they can not do much to warn of a tsunami when it first started this journey from the ocean floor, they certainly can track it within a few minutes when it is ground.

My heart goes out to the victims Cyclone Ketsana and the recent tsunami Samoan, but I'm relieved that our fairly new storm tracking system has seen it's first real test.
Many scientists agree at some point in the 21st century, we see an earthquake and tsunami on the scale of Cascadian tsunami from 300 years ago. No a working warning system in place, the results could be far worse than the Indonesian tsunami of 2004.

Now that our tidal warning system is seen a full dress rehearsal, I feel much better about being ready when the big one does indeed come.

About the Author

Ryan W. Campbell is an assistant editor for the newly launched Pameno.com. You can read more of his work there.

Ryan is from the Texas Gulf Coast and is a 16 year veteran of the United States Navy. He's a fan of motorcycles, extreme weather, camping, and fishing.