The accompanying video, which apparently was shot today in San Diego Harbor, shows the subtle nature of a tidal surge caused by a tsunami generated by a faraway disturbance.
The video was passed to Philip Friedman of 976-TUNA, and Friedman passed it to me. It's long but worth watching. Keep your eye on the bottle.
My brother Scott, who works at King Harbor Marine Center in Redondo Beach, said he saw a similar surge within King Harbor at about lunchtime Saturday.
Thankfully, the Pacific-wide tsunami generated by the massive earthquake early Saturday morning in Chile, did not cause widespread damage. Unfortunately, more than 200 people were killed in Chile by the 8.8-magnitude earthquake.
-- Pete Thomas
Great video. Now I have to go watch some paint dry.
Posted by: Artie | Feb 27, 2010 at 10:12 PM
Tsunami my ass.
That was a glitch in The Matrix
Posted by: Sean | Feb 27, 2010 at 10:00 PM
Tish. Thanks for sharing that. Sorry I failed to attribute properly. You did a good job filming that, tho. What a day, huh?
Posted by: Pete Thomas | Feb 27, 2010 at 08:43 PM
This video shows one real danger of tsunami. Namely, they are slow, they are curiosities. Here we have a bunch of people standing around watching the water recede, then it comes back pretty quickly. What would they have done if the crest had been bigger or the bathymetry had focused the wave? Ever tried to outrun a wave?
Now, these people were probably safe even for a larger event as San Diego hasn't historically gotten the big flooding waves. But before the warning system, a tsunami would silently cross the Pacific, perhaps a trough arrive first drawing out the water from the shore, people would come down to the beach to see what was happening, perhaps some would try to pick up fish, etc. from the pools left behind. Then 5, 10, 15 minutes later, the much larger crest arrives, rushing up the beach, then rapidly receding taking the onlookers out to sea. The 1960 Chilean earthquake generated a tsunami that wiped out Hilo much like Thailand got hit. I saw a photo of parking meters bent flush with the ground from the current.
Posted by: JKB | Feb 27, 2010 at 08:41 PM
Pete, I shot that video today and posted it to my youtube account. Just wanted you to know who filmed it. Thanks for sharing it! :-)
Posted by: Tish Deering | Feb 27, 2010 at 08:27 PM