Tsunami could hit West Coast

[MiniLindsey]

http://cnn.aimtoday.cnn.com/news/sto...00.htm&sc=1501

[skcin]

Run, Amber, run!

Sorry, bad joke. I can only take so much bad news before I start thinking inappropriately funny thoughts. I have been know to laugh right before a funeral too.

Anyway, is anyone really surprised that it could happen here? Seems like common sense to me - why would the US be immune?

[GardenStateGirlie]

Originally Posted by skcin

....why would the US be immune?

Well, we wouldn't necessarily be ammune but we are better off AS OF NOW then those in the far East...here's why...

:Puts on science nerd glasses: O_o

That particular part of the Pacific sits on a hotbed of activity called the ring of fire in which a few of the tectonic plates come together. Yes, the Pacific plate does end at costal California (which is the cause of many an earthquake). However, in this particular portion of the world, THREE plates are meeting. Everything you see in red here? Volcanic/earthquake activity.



You can tell from the picture that the East coast isn't effected by such activity because the plate we sit on ends in the middle of Atlantic Ocean. Now, of course, who's to say that won't change in the next few thousand years/million, etc. but as of now, it's not as big of a threat as it is to those people.

[Merf]

I love the stuffing out of you, Marissa.

We? are such science geeks. Maybe we should ditch the USC/nursing thing and go straight into Volcanology? (sp?) Hawaii is beautiful this time of year (and all year...)

[Merf]

Speaking of volcanoes... not to scare anyone but I was watching Nightline last night and they were discussing how there is a dormant volcano that sits in the Canary Islands off the coast of Western Africa that, if it erupts, it could break apart, fall into the ocean, and cause a landslide tsunami that could potentially affect the entire eastern US coast from Miami all the way up to Boston.

It's dormant but there was a guy on there who studies it and wants more attention paid to it.

[ontheEdgeof17]

Originally Posted by Merf

Speaking of volcanoes... not to scare anyone but I was watching Nightline last night and they were discussing how there is a dormant volcano that sits in the Canary Islands off the coast of Western Africa that, if it erupts, it could break apart, fall into the ocean, and cause a landslide tsunami that could potentially affect the entire eastern US coast from Miami all the way up to Boston.

It's dormant but there was a guy on there who studies it and wants more attention paid to it.

Freaky.

If you move to the west coast, there are earthquakes. The east coast has hurricanes. Central US has tornadoes. There is no getting away from Mother Nature, and to me, that is scary.

[GardenStateGirlie]

Originally Posted by Merf

I love the stuffing out of you, Marissa.

We? are such science geeks. Maybe we should ditch the USC/nursing thing and go straight into Volcanology? (sp?) Hawaii is beautiful this time of year (and all year...)

Awwww...i love the vanilla soy latte out of you, Meredth. (because incase anyone didn't know? Merf? she's made out of Starbucks products).

Heeee we are but I love this stuff. I like Earth Science a lot for some reason. I've just always found this type of nature and the solar system completely and totally fascinating.

Hawaii? I'm gamed.

I saw that same program last night--very scary but eventually it's going to happen. The Earth isn't going to be around forever and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. The sun can only burn for so long before it runs out of hydrogen/helium, expands, takes the milky way galaxy with it and then burns out.

SCIENCE)!*#!@*)!@! O_o <33

[amber]

Originally Posted by GardenStateGirlie

Awwww...i love the vanilla soy latte out of you, Meredth. (because incase anyone didn't know? Merf? she's made out of Starbucks products).

Heeee we are but I love this stuff. I like Earth Science a lot for some reason. I've just always found this type of nature and the solar system completely and totally fascinating.

Hawaii? I'm gamed.

I saw that same program last night--very scary but eventually it's going to happen. The Earth isn't going to be around forever and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. The sun can only burn for so long before it runs out of hydrogen/helium, expands, takes the milky way galaxy with it and then burns out.

SCIENCE)!*#!@*)!@! O_o <33

Ah, looks like I need to put on my science nerd punching fists. yyyewmp. ok, all ready for ya, Riss...
JK. Actually, I hope it happens today, tomorrow, or next day, as i will be inland. But, yeah, SF is so going into the Ocean sometime.... Actually, I have an inordinate fear of Tsunamis, so i hope i don't have a fricking heart attack before i can escape...Also i'd like to say, while being baaaad at science (except Earth science) I am a hybrid of the science nerd, which is the science show watching nerd...

[estranged4life]

if you're a science/math nerd (I'm a math nerd, What can I say...I hated science cause it was rather boring beyond all belief) here's a figure that shows how heavy/strong water can be:

1 cubic foot of water weighs 65lbs (Think of a 1 foot high, 1 foot wide & 1 foot deep fish tank)

If ya take a 10'x10' room with a 10' ceiling thats 1000 cubic feet and multiply that by 65lbs. (Which is the weigh on 1 cubic foot of water mentioned above) ya end up with 65,000lbs. of water in a very small area, Imagine what those folk had to endure when the water landed upon 'em.

Imagining the amount of water the Tsunami generated to cause that much damage is mind bogglin'

Brian j.

[David]

Originally Posted by skcin

Anyway, is anyone really surprised that it could happen here? Seems like common sense to me - why would the US be immune?

Tsunamis can occur in any ocean anywhere in the world. In fact, they can occur in any large body of water anywhere in the world. Nobody is "immune." True, these waves are much more prevalent in certain parts of the world -- more likely to hit certain shorelines over certain others -- but physical laws are the same in every body of water on Earth. Fluid mechanics is fluid mechanics, seismicity is seismicity. When you displace the water column, it has to go somewhere.

The largest tsunami on record occurred in a small bay (5 miles long & 2 miles wide) in Alaska in 1958. Generated by a monolithic rock & ice slide, this wave caused a splash-up that razed the forest on one of the headbanks 520 meters above sea level -- that's higher than any skyscraper on Earth. (Tsunamis can be generated by thrust-type earthquakes with vertical movement, landslides, slumps, volcanic caldera collapses, lava flows, glacier calving -- anything that moves the water out of equilibrium so that gravity tries to rebalance it.)

The point was made very well yesterday on MSNBC by Gerard Fryer, a geophysicist in Hawaii who teaches at the university & studies tsunamis. The newscaster asked him "Can it happen here?" (which they've been asking constantly since last week) & he pointed to where he was standing -- on a beach near Hilo -- & said, "This spot was 30 feet underwater in 1946." The newscaster got the picture.

Of all U.S. states, Alaska & Hawaii get hit by tsunamis the most, by far. However, Washington, Oregon & California have all had tsunamis (in fact, last week's tsunami sent gravity waves to San Diego tide gauges). Dozens of people died in Crescent City CA in 1964 after a quake in the Aleutians. That tsunami traveled all the way down the coast of the continent; it even hit Chile.

No matter what beach you're on, anywhere in the world, if you see a drawdown & feel a strong quake that knocks you off your feet, get up, grab your kids & run inland or get to the nearest high-rise.

[DrummerDeanna]

Originally Posted by ontheEdgeof17

Freaky.

If you move to the west coast, there are earthquakes. The east coast has hurricanes. Central US has tornadoes. There is no getting away from Mother Nature, and to me, that is scary.

New Mexico is pretty isoluated from everything mentioned above- where I grew up we have little to no severe weather there....why oh why did I leave lol....

[Hawkeye]

Originally Posted by ontheEdgeof17

Freaky.

If you move to the west coast, there are earthquakes. The east coast has hurricanes. Central US has tornadoes. There is no getting away from Mother Nature, and to me, that is scary.

Buffalo gets none of those You just have to put up with a litle snow, which isn't all that bad.

[Villavic]

Originally Posted by skcin

Run, Amber, run!

Sorry, bad joke. I can only take so much bad news before I start thinking inappropriately funny thoughts. I have been know to laugh right before a funeral too.

Did you laugh after 9/11? I remember receiving lot of email jokes. Some were really fun, if you read them with cold blood. But actually it wasn't something to be amused.

[skcin]

Originally Posted by Villavic

Did you laugh after 9/11? I remember receiving lot of email jokes. Some were really fun, if you read them with cold blood. But actually it wasn't something to be amused.

9/11 was probably the only instance in my life when I could not laugh at all. Ever. Never. OJ jokes - funny. I even chucked at a Princess Di joke or two. But not 9/11.

[Merf]

Originally Posted by GardenStateGirlie

Awwww...i love the vanilla soy latte out of you, Meredth. (because incase anyone didn't know? Merf? she's made out of Starbucks products).

Word. On the days I don't work? I'm like a fiend.

I saw that same program last night--very scary but eventually it's going to happen. The Earth isn't going to be around forever and there's not a damn thing we can do about it. The sun can only burn for so long before it runs out of hydrogen/helium, expands, takes the milky way galaxy with it and then burns out.

SCIENCE)!*#!@*)!@! O_o <33

Awww, Le Riss... always the optimist