mk30h
01-07-2005, 09:34 PM
Just read the following- and it makes the SE Asia tsunami look like a ripple. I suspect that if you cored some samples from central florida you would find it was washed clean by seawater more recently than this. Anyone wonder why there were very few people in the area when the Spanish first arrived?
'Mega-tsunami' a certainty with time, scientist warns
Last Updated Thu, 06 Jan 2005 13:45:42 EST
CBC News
SANTA CRUZ, CALIF. - A "mega-tsunami" originating from a Canary Islands volcano will one day wreak certain havoc along the eastern coast of North America and much of Europe, researchers say.
"This is not just speculation," Steven Ward, a research geophysicist at the University of California at Santa Cruz, told CBC News. "Probability in the next year is low, but probability in the next 10,000 years is a certainty."
The Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma is gradually disintegrating, and ultimately will send a massive amount of rock into the ocean, according to Ward and his colleague, Simon Day of the Benfield Research Hazard Centre in London.
"We know that this volcano did fall into the sea half a million years ago. Since then, it's rebuilt itself and it's getting ready to do another show, basically," Ward said.
A computer-based model of the volcano's self-destruction estimates the displaced rock will measure about 25 kilometres in height, 15 kilometres in width, and two kilometres in depth, the pair found.
"This huge amount of rock moving at 100 metres per second. The water has to get out of the way – it's as simple as that," Ward said.
What scientists cannot predict is when the volcano will collapse.
"[There is] an indication that it's getting toward the end of its life cycle. When that is, if it's 50 years or 500 or 5,000, we don't know."
The catastrophe is described as a mega-tsunami, referring to "any tsunami source that makes waves bigger than the biggest earthquake," Ward said.
At source, the volcano's collapse will create waves hundreds of metres high.
'Mega-tsunami' a certainty with time, scientist warns
Last Updated Thu, 06 Jan 2005 13:45:42 EST
CBC News
SANTA CRUZ, CALIF. - A "mega-tsunami" originating from a Canary Islands volcano will one day wreak certain havoc along the eastern coast of North America and much of Europe, researchers say.
"This is not just speculation," Steven Ward, a research geophysicist at the University of California at Santa Cruz, told CBC News. "Probability in the next year is low, but probability in the next 10,000 years is a certainty."
The Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma is gradually disintegrating, and ultimately will send a massive amount of rock into the ocean, according to Ward and his colleague, Simon Day of the Benfield Research Hazard Centre in London.
"We know that this volcano did fall into the sea half a million years ago. Since then, it's rebuilt itself and it's getting ready to do another show, basically," Ward said.
A computer-based model of the volcano's self-destruction estimates the displaced rock will measure about 25 kilometres in height, 15 kilometres in width, and two kilometres in depth, the pair found.
"This huge amount of rock moving at 100 metres per second. The water has to get out of the way – it's as simple as that," Ward said.
What scientists cannot predict is when the volcano will collapse.
"[There is] an indication that it's getting toward the end of its life cycle. When that is, if it's 50 years or 500 or 5,000, we don't know."
The catastrophe is described as a mega-tsunami, referring to "any tsunami source that makes waves bigger than the biggest earthquake," Ward said.
At source, the volcano's collapse will create waves hundreds of metres high.