U.S. not ready for Pacific tsunami, scientists warn - The Cascadia Subduction Zone

[link to www.thenewstribune.com]
U.S. not ready for Pacific tsunami, scientists warn

More than six years after the Indian Ocean tsunami shocked the world with its deadly power, communities along the West Coast of the United States remain ill-prepared for a similar event, concludes a report from the National Academy of Sciences.

More than six years after the Indian Ocean tsunami shocked the world with its deadly power, communities along the West Coast of the United States remain ill-prepared for a similar event, concludes a report from the National Academy of Sciences.

An earthquake on the offshore fault called the Cascadia subduction zone could send waves crashing to the shores of Washington, Oregon and Northern California within minutes – not enough time for local authorities to issue warnings or evacuate, said review leader John Orcutt, of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.

“That’s what happened to Banda Aceh (in Indonesia), and the disquieting thing is that it could happen to us,” he said.

The only way to prepare people for such a fast-moving disaster is to deeply ingrain a simple message, Orcutt said: When the ground.............
[link to www.thenewstribune.com]
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[link to news.xinhuanet.com]
Earthquake message proves a hard sell in Vancouver


by Al Campbell

VANCOUVER, Sept. 8 (Xinhua) -- Vancouver is awaiting the "Big One".

With its location in the Cascadia subduction zone, a seismically-active area, the question is not if an earthquake will hit the Canadian city, but when.

For generations Vancouverites have heard that a major earthquake is due to hit the city "once every 500 years", but it has never happened. As a result, locals have grown pessimistic and even indifferent to the possibility of it ever happening. The last major quake was thought to have hit the city about 300 years ago, long before western settlers arrived.

Yet, with its location on the Pacific west coast, along a stretch that includes Anchorage, Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles, cities that have all been hit and damaged by earthquakes, new research points out Vancouver's time could be closer than originally thought.

According to research released by the University of Oregon earlier this year, there is a one-in-three chance that a major earthquake could strike the Pacific Northwest, an area home to Seattle, Portland, Vancouver and Victoria, within the next 50 years.

The researchers believe Cascadia is not one large subduction zone stretching from northern California to British Columbia, as previously thought, but at least four separate segments. They suggest that instead of the entire fault rupturing at once, it will break into smaller parts with more frequent earthquakes.

"We need to be ready for it," states Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson, who has made environmental issues for the city his top priority since taking office two years ago."There's a huge role for citizens to be prepared. I don't think Vancouverites are anywhere near as ready as they should be in their homes. We see significantly more energy and preparedness and awareness around California, for example. We're looking at some of their educations efforts to implement here."

The city currently has an emergency preparedness team promoting to residents to "Be prepared not scared" for the possibility, and that earthquakes usually strike without warning. The program includes online videos to help families and individuals be better prepared for a disaster, and a "Neighborhood Emergency Preparedness Program" involving workshops to get residents ready for getting through the crucial first 72 hours of a quake, among others.

Yet, with local research showing only 17 percent of Vancouverites prepared for the possibility of an earthquake, Robertson said more needed to be done to drive the message home. "There's no question that eventually it will happen.".........

The city is...............
[link to news.xinhuanet.com]
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[link to tdn.com]
Coastal communities shouldn't underestimate tsunami threat

Congress loosened the purse strings following the deadly 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, providing tens of millions of dollars to expand a network of early warning buoys and help coastal communities become "tsunami ready." The money, for the most part, has been well spent, according to an independent study requested by Congress.

The National Research Council reported Friday that the early warning system of buoys and tidal gauges is much improved, though it would benefit from better coordination between the federal Tsunami Warning Centers in Hawaii and Alaska. And residents of communities along the West Coast generally are better prepared to respond appropriately to tsunami warnings. This is somewhat encouraging — particularly the part dealing with public response.

A very troubling reality for residents of coastal communities in Washington, Oregon and Northern California is that there can be no useful early warning for a tsunami produced by an earthquake along the Cascadia subduction zone. Because the fault is just 75 or so miles off shore, there will be precious little time to respond before the first waves arrive - perhaps 15 minutes. That's hardly enough to time for warnings from local authorities to sink in, let alone get to higher ground.

John Orcutt of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.....
[link to tdn.com]
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[link to seattletimes.nwsource.com]
U.S. West Coast remains ill-prepared for tsunami, says science report

By Sandi Doughton

Seattle Times science reporter

More than six years after the Indian Ocean tsunami shocked the world with its deadly power, communities along the West Coast of the United States remain ill-prepared for a similar event, concludes a report from the National Academy of Sciences.

An earthquake on the offshore fault called the Cascadia subduction zone could send waves crashing to the shores of Washington, Oregon and Northern California within minutes — not enough time for local authorities to issue warnings or evacuate, said review leader John Orcutt, of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.

"That's what happened to Banda Aceh (in Indonesia), and the disquieting thing is that it could happen to us," he said.

The only way to prepare people for such a fast-moving disaster is to deeply ingrain a simple message, Orcutt said: When the ground shakes or the water pulls back from the shore, move uphill as quickly as possible.

States and local communities have undertaken education programs to spread that message, but results are uneven and approaches vary widely. In some towns........
[link to seattletimes.nwsource.com]
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[link to tv.sky.com]
Monster Quake: Will We Survive?

On February 27, 2010, the fifth most powerful earthquake ever recorded hit less than 115 kilometres away from Chile's second biggest city, Concepción.

It was a massive wake-up call for cities all along the Pacific Northwest coastline: what would happen if a similar magnitude earthquake were to hit Seattle, Vancouver or Portland?

It could happen.

Teams of forensic engineers and seismologists from California, Washington State and British Columbia are on the ground in Chile, sifting through the devastation and gathering crucial first-hand data to help them predict the next mega-quake.

In the Pacific Northwest, the next mega-quake's origins.....
[link to tv.sky.com]
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[link to media-newswire.com]
Subseafloor Observatories Installed to Run Dynamic Experiments

Media-Newswire.com) - Marine geologists have returned from two months at sea off British Columbia, Canada, where they installed two observatories in the ocean floor to run innovative experiments at the bottom of the sea.

The Integrated Ocean Drilling Program ( IODP ) "Juan de Fuca Ridge-Flank Hydrogeology" expedition--Expedition 327--left Victoria, Canada, on July 9th and returned on September 5th.

Using the scientific research vessel JOIDES Resolution, the team drilled boreholes 530 meters deep ( nearly 1,800 feet ) into the ocean floor to install the observatories.

"The ocean crust is the largest aquifer on the planet," says expedition co-chief scientist Andy Fisher of the University of California at Santa Cruz. "We know it's made up of many sections, but we have no idea how these parts connect or how they interact with one another. The observatories will help us find answers."

These observatories, known as "CORKs" ( because they are used to seal boreholes ), were installed 200 kilometers ( 125 miles ) west of Vancouver Island, Canada.

Each CORK is packed with scientific instruments that collect samples and data at multiple depths to learn more about the water, pressures, temperatures, chemistry, and microbiology within the rocks and sediments of the ocean crust.

"Expedition 327 has completed some of the most complex borehole observatory installations ever attempted," says Jamie Allan, program director in the National Science Foundation's ( NSF ) Division of Ocean Sciences, which funds IODP.

"These observatories will measure directly, within the oceanic crust, key characteristics that govern an unseen, remote, yet geographically widespread biological world, and will support long-term chemical and biological sampling and environmental monitoring of this exotic habitat."

The CORKs are being used as part of a sampling and monitoring network to allow scientists to determine the properties of the ocean crust, and to better understand how water, heat, and chemicals are transported across vast distances below the bottom of the ocean.

The volume of salt water in the ocean crust is comparable to the volume of fresh water in Earth's ice caps and glaciers - about 20-30 million cubic kilometers.

For comparison, this is about 2,000 times greater.......
[link to media-newswire.com]
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Last Edited by Trickster on 09/27/2010 06:36 PM