Living Alaska, Tsunami’s

Tsunami’s

When people think Tsunami, they rarely think of Alaska. They should, we have had the largest recorded tsunamis in the world. In 1958 the Lituya Tsunami was recorded at 1,700 feet. The Prince William Sound tsunami in 1964 wiped out the town of Valdez and did major damage to Anchorage, Whittier, and Seward. That tsunami was only twenty-seven feet high. The time between the earthquake and the tsunami was minimal, the damage was massive.

The tsunami in Fukushima, Japan that knocked out their Nuclear Power Plants was 128 feet and traveled six miles inland. The one in Indonesia was one hundred feet high and killed over 200,000 people. Imagine what a 1,700-foot tsunami would look like. That is a quarter mile high wave traveling at a hundred miles an hour. Not a good day if you are anywhere near it

We have Tsunami evacuation signs all over my city. I pass them every day and wonder what we would all do if there was one in our town. If it were one hundred feet, the evacuation zone would be ok. The city I live in rises high above the 100-foot mark. It would wipe out the town, but the people would survive. Thank God for that, but I hope that we never have to evacuate for a tsunami.

There is a sign right outside my apartment building. I know which way to go during a tsunami warning. The sign has a little arrow that points me in the right direction. That is a good thing because if it happens at night, I might forget which way is uphill. Little chance of that. We have Tsunami’s in Alaska, just another tidbit of information you might want if you plan to move here. I still love Alaska though, call me crazy. From Ketchikan with love.