National Geographic: Tsunami - Killer Wave Page #3

---

regions on earth.

The Japanese know that

the sea's bounty

is often matched by its wrath.

In 1896, an offshore quake

sent 100-foot waves

crashing into villages

on the Sanriku Coast.

The next morning,

local fishermen returning to shore

were stunned.

A few miles out at sea,

they had not even noticed

the tsunami passing

under their boats.

Now they found

their homes destroyed,

their families decimated.

More than 22,000 had drowned.

Four decades later,

it happened again.

by the wall of water

and many in their crews drowned.

Government aid is being rushed,

but it will be a long time

before this stricken region

can be restored in the land

of the rising sun.

The Japanese are no strangers

to tsunamis.

Killer waves,

like the ones

recorded in the news footage,

visit their shores

with frightening regularity.

But even the Japanese

can be taken by surprise.

In 1993, a quake

off the coast of Okushiri Island

generates tsunami waves

that reach shore

in less than 10 minutes

It's the middle of the night,

and most do not have time

to evacuate.

One of the lucky ones is television

cameraman Hiroshi Nakamura

who records his own escape on video.

There was a straight road

from our hotel to the hills.

We reached the crossroads

as we were driving to the hills.

Usually, we would turn to the left,

but the driver saw something like

white waves ahead on his left side

The disaster I saw from the hill

was just like a war movie.

The devastation was something

that made a strong impression on me.

The fact that

the whole town vanished

is something I haven't forgotten.

Nearly 200 died that night

in Okushiri.

On the southern tip of the island,

where there were hundreds of homes,

only rubble remained.

Dr. Eddie Bernard arrived

in Okushiri two days later

with a special tsunami task force.

Well, my emotional reaction was...

it was like being at ground zero

of the atomic bomb or something...

You just couldn't believe

the destruction.

The power of these waves

was far more than I had expected.

Although I had been studying

this phenomenon for 25 years...

I'd never seen the power

of a devastating tsunami...

and what it actually could do.

You just look at some of

the structures

that were ripped apart

and saw how things

were destroyed entirely.

Then you start to appreciate

the forces at work here.

Looking at a photograph of

a young girl

who wasn't too much older

than my daughter at that time,

really brought home the fact

that most of the people

who died in this event

were young children or the elderly.

What we actually could see

were the remnants of people's lives.

Then you realize that...

these 500 homes had destroyed

the lives of hundreds of families.

And, of course,

death was part of that process.

And so...

you had to be very respectful

of what we were actually looking at.

Although

it was scientifically important,

we didn't want to be disrespectful

for those people who had passed away

And it motivated me as a research

scientist to realize that

the real reason for studying

tsunamis in the research mode

is to save a few lives.

And that's the bottom line.

Today Okushiri is slowly recovering

from its tragedy.

The people are rebuilding

their homes

and repairing their lives.

But because space is

at a premium here,

most new homes must be built

where the old ones stood...

making them just as vulnerable

to the next tsunami.

There is no one spot, however,

that will probably never be rebuilt.

The devastated southern tip

of the island

will likely remain an empty zone,

a reminder of

what was taken by the sea

Two hundred miles to the south

is another town

that has long suffered

the ravages of tsunamis.

Over the past century,

Taro has seen

The people of this town have learned

to carry on in the face of tragedy,

to live with

the continual threat of disaster.

The last great wave struck here

in 1933

It left Taro in ruins, and wiped out

nearly a quarter of its population.

A year later,

the survivors fought back.

They built a wall

to keep the sea

in check the next time it rose.

Today, the wall dominates the town,

a reinforced concrete battlement

and in some spots,

For the people of Taro,

it's become a familiar

and reassuring part of the landscape

In the summer, the seawall

gets warmed up

and I cannot sleep

because the heat reflects off of it.

At that time

I wish there were no seawall,

but I never forget

its reason for existing.

If there were no wall,

I wouldn't want to live here.

Taro is also protected

by its own tsunami warning center.

Besides the usual

satellite technology

there are video cameras,

permitting technicians to

monitor the harbor 24 hours a day,

looking for changes in sea levels

and awaiting the inevitable.

And if alarms are sounded,

Taro is ready.

Crack teams of gatekeepers

carry out regular drills,

closing the wall's six doors

against the sea.

Each of the massive steel doors must

be sealed in under four minutes.

They've never been tested

against a major tsunami.

The seawall certainly offers

the people of Taro

a measure of comfort,

but that may not be enough.

It's 34-foot height

should stop most waves.

But the infamous tsunami of 1896

had waves over 90 feet high.

There's just no way to know

how big the next one will be.

Back on the wave-ravaged island

of Okushiri,

they're building their own wall.

When it's completed,

it will surround nearly

a quarter of the island,

providing at least partial

protection against the next tsunami.

But the people of Okushiri

haven't put all their faith

in reinforced concrete.

In a ceremony held every June,

they pay homage to the dead,

including hundreds of

tsunami victims,

enshrining their memories in stone.

As darkness falls, a bonfire is

lit to serve as a beacon,

guiding home

those who were lost to the waves.

Paper lanterns symbolize

the souls of the victims,

released once again to the sea.

It is an act of remembrance and

perhaps a prayer for deliverance.

The threat of tsunami is not

as distant as most of us think.

Half a world away

from the fishing villages of Japan

lies the Northwest Coast

of the United States.

The town of Crescent City,

California,

shares a tragic legacy

with Taro and Okushiri.

People here can still recall their

own encounter with a deadly wave

March 27, 1964.

Good Friday.

A violent earthquake

off the coast of Alaska

generates an enormous tsunami.

The Pacific Coast of North America,

from Vancouver to San Diego,

lies in its path.

At 11 that night,

Crescent City Civil Defense Chief,

Bill Parker,

receives urgent news.

My first experience with a tsunami

was a teletype

that came into my office

And it said that

there was a probability of a tsunami

and it gave an estimated time

of arrival in Zulu time.

Well, we didn't even know

what a tsunami was,

let alone know how to spell it.

And we certainly didn't know

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes