Posted on 03/29/2005 3:41:11 PM PST by ex-Texan
A wall of water up to 55 yards high crashing into the Atlantic seaboard of the United States, flattening everything in its path -- not a Hollywood movie but a dire prophecy by some British and U.S. academics.
As the international community struggles to aid victims of last month's devastating tsunami in southern Asia, scientists warn an eruption of a volcano in Spain's Canary Islands could unleash a "mega-tsunami" larger than any in recorded history.
Hammocks almost buried at the beach of Pajara district in Fuerteventura island (Canary Island), southern Spain. Countries all around the Atlantic rim could be hit by killer tsunamis at any time between now and the next 10,000 years, the British government's chief scientific adviser said.[AFP/file]
According to their controversial study, an explosion of the Cumbre Vieja volcano on the island of La Palma could send a chunk of rock twice the size of the Isle of Wight into the Atlantic at up to 220 miles an hour.
Many experts believe the risk of "mega-tsunamis" from such a massive landslide on La Palma has been hugely overstated.
But in the study's scenario, energy released would equal the electricity consumption of the United States for six months, sending gigantic tidal waves across the Atlantic at the speed of a jet plane.
Devastation in the United States would reach trillions of dollars with tens of millions of lives at risk. Spain, Portugal, Britain, France, Brazil, the Caribbean and West Africa would also be swamped by giant waves.
"It may occur in the next eruption, which could be next year, or ... it may be 10 eruptions down the line," said Bill McGuire of Britain's Benfield Hazard Research Center.
Cumbre Vieja, which last exploded in 1971, typically erupts at intervals of between 20 and 200 years.
"We just don't know when it will happen, but are people prepared to take the risk after the Indian Ocean events?" McGuire said, calling for a program to monitor the slide in Cumbre Vieja's flank.
"We need to get people out in advance of the collapse itself. Once the collapse has happened, the Caribbean would have 9 hours, the U.S. 6 to 12 hours to evacuate tens of millions of people," he said.
SCAREMONGERING?
Other experts say such predictions about La Palma or the Hawaiian volcano of Kilauea are grossly exaggerated.
The Tsunami Society, an international association of experts, dismisses such theories as "scaremongering." It argues Cumbre Vieja would not collapse in a single block and the wave generated would be much smaller.
"We are talking about thousands of years in the future. Anything could happen. An asteroid could also fall on earth," George Pararas-Carayannis, founder of the Tsunami Society, said.
Many wave experts believe tsunami from abrupt landslides dissipate more quickly than those generated by powerful earthquakes, like the Dec. 26 quake off Indonesia which stretched thousands of miles along the ocean floor.
Charles Mader, editor of the Science of Tsunami Hazards journal and an expert on wave modeling, predicts that even in the event of a massive landslide on La Palma the tsunami reaching North America would be no more than 1 meter high.
But McGuire stands by the wave modeling for the La Palma tsunami, carried out by Steven Ward of the University of California.
As the world reels from the Indian Ocean disaster, which killed more than 150,000 people, oceanographers and geologists agree the threat of tsunamis has been underestimated.
"It would not surprise me at all if tomorrow we saw another tsunami like this," said Pararas-Carayannis, pointing to faults off Portugal, Puerto Rico and Peru as possible risks.
For McGuire, a warning system in the Indian Ocean could have completely prevented loss of life in Sri Lanka and India from south Asian tsunami, as in most cases people would only have had to travel 1 kilometer inland to avoid the waves.
He ranks tsunami risk as second only to global warming in the hazards facing the planet.
"With coastlines massively built up now, particularly in developing countries, tsunami are a big problem because, unlike earthquakes, they transmit death and destruction across entire oceans," he said.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1373322/posts?page=98#98
An act of God is not really what I had in mind. Why is an Islamic Cleric predicting a mega-tsunami wiping out the East Coast? Can a huge landslide be triggered on the volcano on the Island of La Palma. I dunno. Do you?
I beieve 76834 is onto something. But I do not pretend to be psychic. Just a word of warning to the wise.
I guess that's a pretty safe time line.
Beam me up, Scotty.
"I read right here on FR that this isn't going to happen."
Hey, if you read it here on FR, then we know it CAN'T happen! :)
If it wasn't for scare mongery there wouldn't be much news. You gotta wonder if these people that say this stuff actually believe it or just like to see their name in print.
Well, the Hilna Slump on the big island of the Hawaiian chain would make a tsunami easily twice the size of what's predicted for this island.
That's very specific forecasting, isn't it? Bwah! The killer meteor will hit us before then!
That would be a typical government program. It would bring on the very thing it's designed to prevent. Although I guess those things would prevent collapse of the volcano, and thus the worst of the tsunami, but they are also bound to set the sucker off.
But what does the Reader's Digest have to say on the matter?
I was kidding.
Unfortunately, you know some schmuck in Congre$$ will come up with a harebrained idea to wa$te our money preventing something that may never happen when we have real problems like China.
Discovery Channel did a show on this a week or so after the big tsunami over the Christmas holiday. It was interesting the first few times. Only thing I really noted out of it is that such a wave could roll up to 11 miles inland. So my new home is ral close to where it would end. Ocean Front property!
The reality is the majority of tsunami scientists disagree with the scenario.
Contrary to the impression given by dramatizations of science, most of the time, lone mavericks in science turn out to be wrong.
At least this article was responsible enough to give the other side. For the 2+ years this story has been overhyped ad nauseam, most articles and documentaries haven't.
Believe or don't believe...if you live on the east coast of America(I do)and you hear on the news that Cumbre Vieja is erupting even the slightest...go west and fast. Don't pack just go west. Even if it's just 30 or 40 miles inland you will be safe.
I'm well over 60 + miles depending on the direction it comes from. With global warming I'll be able to sit in a lawn chair and watch for it year round.
Geeeeez, I worry more about the traffic at the mall.
Get a grip all you chicken hearts (not you HarleyD). We all are going to die sometime. How is you choice. I'm not going to do it while sitting in my dark basement shivering in fear.
Pete
Crapola! We are about to close on an apartment on Shore Road in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Eeegads.
A wall of water up to 55 yards high crashing into the Atlantic seaboard of the United States, flattening everything in its path.
Suddenly my move back to CA is looking like a smart one...
Probably just kill a bunch of Liberals. Who cares?
I'll believe it when I see it.
I'm more concerned about the huge fault line that runs the miss. valley. If a earthquake like the one that happened circa 1812 would happen today.... I hope there is someone out there planning for something like that.
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