Tsunami Warning

[FordGTGuy]

Originally Posted by Stikz Are you stupid, or just joking? 20 inches of fast flowing water can easily sweep you off your feet and drown you. Fox news told him it couldn't.

and I geuss John Kerrys god :roll: also common sense would be that if a tsunami warning is called then get the fuck out. :roll:

[CSedl87]

Water traveling at speeds up to 500mph aint no joke, including if it's 'just' 20 inches. It just could be enough to take you out to sea if you were a smaller person.

[Vansquish]

Originally Posted by CSedl87 Water traveling at speeds up to 500mph aint no joke, including if it's 'just' 20 inches. It just could be enough to take you out to sea if you were a smaller person.

Yes...but keep in mind that when it reaches shallow water a tsunami travels in the range of 8m/s (28.8kph or 18mph) or so...not 500mph (800kph).

In essence a tsunami is caused by a shift of the sea floor. If you imagine you've got two plates end-to-end in the bottom of a tray of water, then you lift one of the plates...the water gets displaced to the other end of the tray. When an earthquake causes a shift in the sea floor, either horizontally or vertically (as in the tray example) then the water gets displaced. The resulting wave will look like nothing more than a ripple or a slight swell until it gets to fairly shallow water (shallow is quite relative, it can still be hundreds of feet deep) and then it starts to build. As it nears shore, the amount of energy necessary to keep the wave going increases, so the wave has to "work" harder to get to shore, thus, it slows down and grows taller. Even so, a wave moving at 18mph is pretty frightening, and even 6 inches of it would sweep you off your feet.