Tsunami devastates Pacific

[Devastatin Dave]

Really sad. Just on a side note, we're mobilizing some aid for the devastated areas. Please donate to the Red Cross.

[Mount Suribachi]

Me and Mrs Suribachi were talking last night about donating some money, but we weren't sure who the best folks to donate too would be. I'll look into the Red Cross.

[tootee]

i read somewhere that tidal waves in the indian ocean is extremely rare.

anyhow just contacted a colleague and his wife who were on holiday in Phuket.. he was at the beach when the waves came, got dragged 100m back and suffer deep cuts to his arm.. fortunately both wife and him are safe now.

life is just so unpredictable..

[Ironside]

Oh, and a boat near shore is toast. Tsunamis are very small until they encounter the drag near shore -- they can literally be nothing but a centimeter or two in deep water. I don't really understand how that works, and I'd probably need some time in a fluid dynamics course to "get" it.

As I said the wave is often thousands of meters deep and that energy is conserved. It happens when a huge body of water is displaced by landslides, earthquakes etc. The energy created starts to move in form of a wave.

Two got links with info about tsunamis.
Link 1
Link 2

The best comparation I came up with was that you have 200 batteries serial-connected to 200 light-bulbs (this is the deep sea), then you remove 199 light-bulbs but keeps the batteries (when it comes towards the coast). Overloaded lightbulb anyone?

One of the worst part is that they were lucky that the tsunami was a "small" one considering the strength of the earthquake.

And it seems that the cruel joke was occuring this time to, the "missing" water at the coast attracted people towards the coast, and then the tsunami comes...

Adrian, I hope your brother is alright.

[7Bear7Scar]

Very few destinations are safe, it seems. I remember watching a documentary on UK television a couple of years ago on a future-event which will make this tsunami appear minor in comparison, the collapse of the volcano Cumbra Vieja is likely to happen in our lifetime, the scientists said.

Florida and the Caribbean, the final destinations in the North Atlantic to be affected by the tsunami, will have to brace themselves for receiving 50 metre high waves - higher than Nelson's column in London, some 8 to 9 hours after the landslide. Towards Europe waves heights will be smaller, but substantial tsunami waves will hit the Atlantic coasts of Britain, Spain Portugal and France.

Link

[nokhor]

Hope you hear from your brother soon, Lemurmania.

[JAG]

I couldn't believe it when a family member told me of it, it was only when I saw it on the news did I believe it. What a devastating thing to happen to the communities in the coast areas of those countries. Not only are thousands dead but their whole villages and infrastructure have been demolished, how many years will it be before they get them back to what they were.

[Shadow]

It’s lucky that Singapore is sheltered by other land masses in the region so we only feel tremors that last about 5 min in some areas. I don’t know what we will do if we were hit by a Tsunami as we have not suffer any natural disasters before.

Phuket have over 300 dead and rising. I heard that the Thai king lost his 21 year old son who was at the beach when it strikes & there are 4 Singaporeans dead two adults and 2 children aged between 3 & 6.

I feel really sad that so many people lost their life.


Hope that you heard good news about your brother soon, Lemurmania

[Lemur]

Still no word from my bro, but I guess that's not surprising. The infrastructure must be pretty beaten up, and I can only-too-easily picture a scenario where someone might get cut off for a few days.

I'm going to give it another 48 hours before I start sweating.

[sharrukin]

there are 4 Singaporeans dead two adults and 2 children aged between 3 & 6.

Do you know who they were? Names?
Were they teachers?