US West Coast tsunami warning signs wave misleading

Big Wave / Tsunamis:

Signs' tsunami icon misleads

Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 18 January 2005: - - Signs that warn of tsunami danger along the coasts of Washington, Oregon and California feature what is fast becoming an international icon: a tall, breaking wave that looks like something out of a surfing movie.

But the shaky, amateur videos recorded along the Indian Ocean last month don't show anything like that. In places, the sea humped up to form what witnesses described as a wall of water. In many other areas, the ocean simply surged in like the tide — so innocuous at first that people stood on the beach, realizing too late that the water was deeper, faster and more powerful than any normal ebb and flow.

Experts long have known that tsunamis rarely form steep, curling waves. Now, some are asking themselves whether images like the ones on the warning signs may have contributed to the horrific death toll in Indonesia, Thailand and other countries by giving people the wrong impression of what a tsunami looks like.

The misconception that tsunamis are large, breaking waves is a real problem,..........
Read the full story at The Seattle Times

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Source: The Seattle Times

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