Earthquake / Tsunami

[dinny_g]

8.8 Magnitude earthquake - the 6th largest ever recorded - in the pacific. Tsunami waves, thankfully so far, small have it Russia Japan and Hawaii but bigger are potentially due...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c3r4x9yrrg4t

My other half's friend is in Tokyo at the moment but visiting family that live in the hills. Should be fine. Still bloody scary though I'm sure

[Holley]

How do Tsunami's work as when I read 30cm Tsumami waves my first thought was that's tiny. But I guess it's a lot different to a regular wave?

[mik]

How do Tsunami's work as when I read 30cm Tsumami waves my first thought was that's tiny. But I guess it's a lot different to a regular wave?

Massive volume of water raised 30cm, so it's not a normal wave crest followed by a dip.

[integrale_evo]

Yeah, that 30cm just keeps pushing and pushing up the shore, rises where it’s forced through small areas etc.

[dinny_g]

Yeah, it's not 30 cm's high but back to sea level a few yards behind the crest. It's a 30 cm high block of water, miles long and miles wide, all flowing in land.

15 footers have hit Russia and 5 or 6 footers have hit Hawaii

Also, the wave height out at sea is a lot smaller than the initial wave crest that hits the shore. As the wave hits land it slows. The bottom slows quicker than the top (friction with the sea floor) which causes the height to rise. So you can get a higher initial wave hit the coast, followed by the block of water that follows it.

[Holley]

Ah that makes sense, thank you!

[KiwiDave]

We were on tsunami watch late last night. The house is 9m from the sea and about 3m up. Everyone in NZ told to get off the water, take large vessels out to sea away from moorings etc. but no one told to evacuate and that no risk to coastal properties. They were right, though we have a drain that sits right outside the downstairs door to the house that flows out to see and I'm fairly sure a wall of water would turn it into a fire hydrant. Was a restless sleep thinking any noise whatsoever could be trouble.

Stood watching the water just now (11:30am local time) which is approaching high tide and the sea is flat and calm but we're definitely seeing odd waves and water flow over the underlying rocks etc. that I've never seen before. Very thankful it's pretty chilled out by the time it got here.

[dinny_g]

[GG.]

We were in Thailand and just leaving for the airport when we heard of this. Fortunately we were well out of the zone of concern but eerily, the hotel we were staying at was just about to open and was largely wrecked by the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004. The nearest village / town (Khao Lak) had some of the highest fatality rates with an upper estimate of about 10,000 killed. Very hard to imaging when you're stood there in such calm and idyllic surroundings.

[jamcg]

There’s an excellent documentary on Disney plus about the Boxing Day tsunami, uses a lot of genuine footage

[GG.]

There’s an excellent documentary on Disney plus about the Boxing Day tsunami, uses a lot of genuine footage

Thanks - I'll look out for that. Not easy viewing though I imagine.

[jamcg]

It’s a 4 part series called “tsunami race against time”