U.S. Tsunami Preparedness on Rise, But a Long Way to Go
December 26, 2005
By Sandi Doughton
Seattle Times staff reporter
Six months after the Indian Ocean tsunami, Flint Wright was watching a tape of "Murder, She Wrote" while some of his neighbors in the Washington coastal community of Long Beach were running for high ground.
No one had called Wright, police chief of the Pacific County town, to let him know that an earthquake off Northern California had triggered a tsunami warning — which turned out to be a false alarm.
On today's anniversary of the Sumatra disaster, Wright is wired to receive automatic notification of future alerts. His five officers know where to go and what to do if a big wave threatens. But the old sirens at the fire station still have to be switched on by hand, and there are no alarm systems along the 25 miles of Pacific County beach.
"We're definitely not where we'd like to be yet, but I can see we've started pushing in the right direction," Wright said.
The same could be said for the state as a whole.
Awareness of tsunami danger has never been higher, and money has started flowing into a field that's long been the stepchild of emergency preparedness. But gaps remain in the warning-and-response system and in people's understanding of how to react, said George Crawford, of the Washington State Emergency Management Division.
This year, the state installed three automated warning stations in coastal towns, bringing the total to six. The station in Ocean Shores, Grays Harbor County, which didn't work during the June false alarm, was replaced. Ten more stations will be added in the coming year, thanks to $500,000 in federal money obtained by U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell. Gov. Christine Gregoire hopes to persuade the state Legislature to pay for 10 more.
Crawford estimates it will take nearly 100 of the stations, which sound an alarm and broadcast instructions, to cover the entire coastline.
With $40 million in new federal money, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is expanding and upgrading a network of tsunami-detection buoys arrayed along the West Coast, said Eddie Bernard, director of NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle. The buoys detect tsunami waves in the open ocean. They can also tell which earthquakes fail to trigger tsunamis, which helps eliminate false alarms.
Warning signs
A tsunami could strike within minutes of a major earthquake off the Northwest coast. You should run to high ground if:
• You feel major ground-shaking.
• You see the water recede.
• At night, you hear a roaring sound offshore.
Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle
This time last year, only three buoys worked. Three others were broken. Today, 11 working buoys are positioned from Alaska's Aleutian Islands to the coast of Chile. Two more will be added this year.
Region is vulnerable
The horror of the Asian tsunami, which killed more than 200,000 people and swept away entire communities, resonated strongly in the Pacific Northwest, which is equally vulnerable to the deadly waves.
Earthquakes in Alaska, Japan or South America can send waves speeding toward the outer coasts of Washington and Oregon. If warning systems work as planned, those distant quakes should provide ample time for evacuation.
The bigger threat is posed by the 600-mile-long Cascadia subduction zone just off the coast. Similar to the geologic fault that ruptured in the massive Indian Ocean quake, the Cascadia fault has unleashed earthquakes nearly as big in the past, the most recent about 300 years ago. Such an event would send waves of 30 feet or more crashing into shore within a half-hour or less. One recent analysis suggests waves up to 90 feet might be possible in some locations.
Continuing for up to 12 hours, the series of waves could also propagate along the Strait of Juan de Fuca, causing serious flooding in areas as far inland as Port Townsend and Bellingham. The waves could reach Seattle but would probably be too small to cause damage.
The false alarm this summer that left Wright fuming also revealed many other flaws in the warning system, most of which have been fixed, Crawford said.
Among improvements already made or on the way are:
• The state is negotiating with local governments to provide centralized, plain English tsunami warnings and information. When a bulletin is issued by the West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center, the state will immediately relay it to local governments, television and radio stations, and automatically activate warning sirens.
• The Tsunami Warning Center, in Palmer, Alaska, will be staffed round-the-clock, beginning in April. Previously, staff members carried beepers but had to rush back to the office if a warning came in at night.
• Five new sea-level gauges have been installed along the Pacific coast to help detect tsunamis. One of the gauges is at La Push, Clallam County. Another will be installed in Westport, Grays Harbor County.
• The state has published evacuation maps for all major coastal communities. The maps show areas of high ground, where residents can take refuge when warning time is short. The maps are available online at: http://emd.wa.gov/5-prog/prgms/eq-tsunami/tsunami-idx.htm.
• NOAA has added six tsunami-modeling teams to simulate, in advance, the flooding that would be caused by tsunamis of various sizes. When an earthquake strikes, the team will be able to select the model that most closely matches its size and shaking pattern, and provide an estimate within minutes of areas that will be hit hardest by the resulting waves. The teams have completed models for nine cities, from Neah Bay and Port Angeles in Clallam County to Hilo, Hawaii, and Kodiak, Alaska.
• A crucial phone line that failed in June has been replaced with a heavy-duty version. The line, from the National Weather Service office in Seattle, conveys warnings to towns on the northern coast.
• Canadian scientists are testing a system that uses global-positioning-system (GPS) sensors to determine within less than a minute whether an underwater earthquake caused the kind of up-and-down ground motion that generates tsunamis. Currently, it takes much longer to figure that out, which leads to unnecessary warnings and evacuations.
Heading for high ground
Technology, warning systems and better communication all help improve the state's ability to get people out of harm's way. But if a tsunami hits with only half an hour's notice, evacuation will be impossible and individuals will be on their own, said Anne Sullivan, emergency and risk manager for Grays Harbor County.
Families, hotels, hospitals and other facilities need to locate the closest high ground and make plans to get there immediately, she said.
"If we have a local tsunami, we're going to have people running to high ground as quickly as they can, and in some areas, there isn't a lot of high ground."
In Long Beach, Wright and emergency managers are looking for an area of high ground near town where they might be able to clear a parking area for evacuees and cache enough water, blankets and other supplies for several days.
"If you want the honest truth, it's kind of going back to the old civil-defense thing," he said. "I just hope and pray that if — God forbid — it happens, we aren't saying: Oh, we should have done more."
Sandi Doughton: 206-464-2491 or sdoughton@seattletimes.com
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