Any tsunami video I look at barely looks like a 20 feet wave hitting shore. But wikipedia tells me there have been dozens of 100+ feet tsunamis even in the last 10 years.
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You are thinking about what a wave looks like when it breaks on a beach, where it is very flat or even curving/ rolling forward on itself on the front side. Tsunamis look like a wave does offshore, a great big sine wave. When it hits, the water actually recedes first as the low part of the wave hits, then comes back up. This doesn’t look like a sudden crash of a wave, but a rush of water that is just a few feet high at first. When you get hit by the first water, the middle of the tsunami is still a ways away. That water level keeps rising a few feet at a time as the wave keeps coming.
This isn’t like a flood though, where there’s a bit of current underneath. The entire volume of water is pushing through at tremendous force with more water coming from behind it to push it forward and further raise the water level. This is why the destruction is so incredible, it pushes everything out of its way and into each other with incredible force.
The height of the tsunami isn’t the height that first hits the shore, it is the highest level that hits the shore several minutes later. It might not look as impressive as what you imagine with a big crescent wave, but is actually worse because a tsunami isn’t just tall, it is thick/deep, meaning a whole lot more water. It would actually be less scary if it was just one giant wall of water.
Would you film a giant tsunami if it was headed your way? Would you survive it to post it? Would your phone survive it?
Japanese Coast Guard ship riding over a tsunami while its was still out in deep water.
Imagine how big it got when close to shore.
That’s not a small boat.
I think most people are missin the mark on this one. The 100+ foot tsunamis I have hear about are all on remote mountainous areas. I’ve hear of a couple in northern bc. One in 2020 or so that was a real big one. But they notices it a month later when flying over the remote areas. Now what you need to get a 300+ foot tall wave is a bottle neck of some sort. The specific one I’m thinking about was cause by a large land slide into a lake pushing all the water in the lake down a narrower steam/river and there being evidence of trees getting washed away way up the hill side. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-landslide-triggered-100-metre-tall-lake-tsunami-study-shows-1.6401469 that’s a link to that story.
I think most people are missin the mark on this one. The 100+ foot tsunamis I have hear about are all on remote mountainous areas. I’ve hear of a couple in northern bc. One in 2020 or so that was a real big one. But they notices it a month later when flying over the remote areas. Now what you need to get a 300+ foot tall wave is a bottle neck of some sort. The specific one I’m thinking about was cause by a large land slide into a lake pushing all the water in the lake down a narrower steam/river and there being evidence of trees getting washed away way up the hill side. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-landslide-triggered-100-metre-tall-lake-tsunami-study-shows-1.6401469 that’s a link to that story.
Japanese Coast Guard ship riding over a tsunami while its was still out in deep water.
Imagine how big it got when close to shore.
That’s not a small boat.
Japanese Coast Guard ship riding over a tsunami while its was still out in deep water.
Imagine how big it got when close to shore.
That’s not a small boat.
You are thinking about what a wave looks like when it breaks on a beach, where it is very flat or even curving/ rolling forward on itself on the front side. Tsunamis look like a wave does offshore, a great big sine wave. When it hits, the water actually recedes first as the low part of the wave hits, then comes back up. This doesn’t look like a sudden crash of a wave, but a rush of water that is just a few feet high at first. When you get hit by the first water, the middle of the tsunami is still a ways away. That water level keeps rising a few feet at a time as the wave keeps coming.
This isn’t like a flood though, where there’s a bit of current underneath. The entire volume of water is pushing through at tremendous force with more water coming from behind it to push it forward and further raise the water level. This is why the destruction is so incredible, it pushes everything out of its way and into each other with incredible force.
The height of the tsunami isn’t the height that first hits the shore, it is the highest level that hits the shore several minutes later. It might not look as impressive as what you imagine with a big crescent wave, but is actually worse because a tsunami isn’t just tall, it is thick/deep, meaning a whole lot more water. It would actually be less scary if it was just one giant wall of water.
You are thinking about what a wave looks like when it breaks on a beach, where it is very flat or even curving/ rolling forward on itself on the front side. Tsunamis look like a wave does offshore, a great big sine wave. When it hits, the water actually recedes first as the low part of the wave hits, then comes back up. This doesn’t look like a sudden crash of a wave, but a rush of water that is just a few feet high at first. When you get hit by the first water, the middle of the tsunami is still a ways away. That water level keeps rising a few feet at a time as the wave keeps coming.
This isn’t like a flood though, where there’s a bit of current underneath. The entire volume of water is pushing through at tremendous force with more water coming from behind it to push it forward and further raise the water level. This is why the destruction is so incredible, it pushes everything out of its way and into each other with incredible force.
The height of the tsunami isn’t the height that first hits the shore, it is the highest level that hits the shore several minutes later. It might not look as impressive as what you imagine with a big crescent wave, but is actually worse because a tsunami isn’t just tall, it is thick/deep, meaning a whole lot more water. It would actually be less scary if it was just one giant wall of water.
Would you film a giant tsunami if it was headed your way? Would you survive it to post it? Would your phone survive it?
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