[monday]

"You are wrong it are not a hill it is the tsunami approaching. If there were hills out there then they would have blocked the wave and the water would have been diverted."

The hills are off to the right. The tsunami is wrapping around the island from the left. Try filling a sink with several glasses and water allowing the glasses to break the surface. Allow the water to completely calm then drop a marble or something else small and watch how the tiny waves bounce every which way and wrap themselves around the glasses.

Islands deform and refract tsunamis in the same way. That explains why the islands off to the left didn't block the tsunami. Some of the major damage to Sri Lanka was on the western shore which faces away from the epicenter.

[redheadtoo]

The turbulent white water is directly in front of the so called hills. This is not possible.

The blue shape behind the breaking white water is not a hill it is the tsunami wave. The tsunami wave looks exactly like such waves are describe by eye witnesses, a huge wall of water several stories tall.

[Justa]

I've been reading your posts from the beginning of the thread -so put on the flame-retardent attire now. ; )

You keep referring to tsunamis as waves when they're actually energy-surges caused by the displacement of the earth's crust. Besides totally different mechanics, the energy transmitted through the ocean by a 9.0 earthquake is several orders of magnatudes greater than the wind-generated waves your basing your advice on.

Would you similarly advise someone to 'duck under' a storm surge? How about a dam burst? A tsunami is much closer to these than a surf wave.

Have you seen any of the videos? Most of the ones I've seen were from Thai resorts, as in these photos. The tsunamis which hit Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India were much larger. I saw one which was supposedly from Sri Lanka. It showed a 10'+ surge going through a city at probably 15 mph. It ran the entire length of the video. No one was going to be holding their breath under that. And if they were unfortunate enough to be out in the water at the time well... where do you think all the water going through the town came from?

As these photos clearly show tsunamis are not waves but entire bodies of water moving ashore. No one's going to be able to duck under or hold their breath through any appreciably-sized tsunami any better than they could a bursting dam.