Thread: OMG: MAGNITUDE 8.8 EARTHQUAKE HITS CHILE. TSUNAMI ON THE WAY

Who has heard?

Perhaps as shocking: Wikipedia's already got a page on it.

This article documents a current earthquake. Information may change rapidly as the event progresses.

That would be a mega-thrust earthquake. It's Chile sliding back suddenly over the Pacific plate that's been scrunching it for years. Perfect way to generate tsunami, because the land kicks seaward.

Is this it?

And I have had the interesting experience of sitting and watching the tsunami surges pushing water into and out of our local marina. Sea level rise and fall was only 700 mm, but the amount of lateral water movement was impressive.

it's with tsunamis as with lions : only the ones that turn up unexpectedly are the really dangerous ones

Originally Posted by marnixR

it's with tsunamis as with lions : only the ones that turn up unexpectedly are the really dangerous ones

Here in Chile, all along the coast of the Maule and Bio-Bio region, 15-20 minutes after the big one (8,8 Richter), the ocean hit the coasts with such strengh , producing even more damage than the same earthquake, in a Tsunami that wasn`t suposed to be produced (it was suposed to go only towards the Northeast of the Pacific), coming back to the mainland. Fortunately the people here are very esceptic with local authorities predictions, so despite of what was said to them, most of the people after the earthquake hit, inmediately went to high grounds, being able to watch how the ocean, ripped their homes to rubbles. If the people would have trusted in what was told to them, body counts by now, would be way much higher, than what they actually are.

i don't deny that the tsunami caused damage in the coastal areas of Chile, but that happened before the media got their teeth into the fear factor

i'm talking about the "fears" raised in the press about a tsunami hitting (gasp! shock horror!) Hawaii or (even worse) the winter olympics in Vancouver - as far as i'm aware the press-generated fears did not materialise, not to the extent that anyone noticed anyway

RickDog, please accept my concerns for the disaster that has befallen your country. Do you have any idea why the authorities believed, or allowed citizens to believe, that any tsunami would move outwards only. That would not have been my expectation, so I am puzzled.

Originally Posted by skeptic

And I have had the interesting experience of sitting and watching the tsunami surges pushing water into and out of our local marina. Sea level rise and fall was only 700 mm, but the amount of lateral water movement was impressive.

One of the more amazing things about these waves is the large wavelength. More people think it's just a big wave, much like those that crash along say Northern Hawaii's North shore popular for surfing. Tsunami's often express themselves as a large set of the surf looking wavers superimposed over the much longer wavelength waver that more resembles a really large and sudden tidal flow.

Some of the Indian ocean vids showed this effect very well. In one particular case I remember the camera man calmly letting the the first wave of the set roll in not realizing the rest of the set would be on top of the the rising water and getting himself into trouble.

Ophiolote, in name of my fellow country men, thanks for your concern. In my case, I´m perfectly well and so is my family. Santiago got it, "mildly" in reference to the Maule and Bio-Bio region.

In regards to your question, its now a matter of local discussion, since it has been found out that there was an alarm by some Naval authorities, but in the transmission of the information, somebody missinterpreted the alarm and thought that it was sensed as the opposite, so they told the people that nothing was to worry about, in other words a very big, sorry to say, "fuckup" about the issue. Fortunately, some local police authorities, didn`t bother to accept the official announcement, and took matters on their own, and sounded a general alarm anyway, so thanks to their disobbediance, many people were warned and had enough time to run to highgrounds and saved themselves, but others weren`t so lucky and now are disappearing. Anyhow, after the earthquake, the waves hit the coasts only minutes after it, so there really wasn`t much time, and many people due to the hour and inexistence of energy (no radio or T.V.), never were able to hear anything at all. Remember, it was at 3:34 A.M., when it hit, most of the people were sleeping, and after it struck, all sources of energy were shut down, so if there was any announcement, it was done by screaming and megaphones, nothing else. The area of Concepcion, was in total uncomunication, till almost half day on Saturday, so many of the rest of the country were total unaware of the magnitud of their distress. We only knew that it was where the earthquake hit harder, but we coludn`t even imagine all that happened afterwards. Even now, there are places where roads and diferent forms of comunication were lost so we don`t know how they are.

It now seems that this quake had a global effect:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/features.cfm?feature=2504

Apparently and based on preliminary model calculations, the earth axis was shifted leading to a variation in the angular velocity. But the effects are so tiny that they would be difficult to measure.