I’ve always thought this as a kid and I’ve been told it doesn’t work that way but never got an actual explanation
In: Physics
How would that help? You’d still get flung up the flooding (and full of debris) coast, and you’d just miss out on that last few seconds of breathing.
Tsunamis are incredibly powerful. They aren’t a wave, they’re more like a wall of water and one that will most likely contain solid objects as anything movable in its path will be picked up. It’s not that you can’t go underwater before it hits, it’s just a very bad idea. The water is not calm once it reaches land but incredibly turbulent, and it will be very difficult to stay on the surface. There will be lots of debris floating around which may injure you, even knocking you unconscious. The force of the water is incredibly strong and there will be no way to fight against it – you’ll be carried wherever the water takes you and that could well be into a tree or the side of a building. The chances of you drowning are incredibly high.
Anywhere that would be safe undewater where a tsunami is, you’d have to be flown out to reach, and the tsunami would hit land before you hit the water, not to mention that it would still be safer in the air. Tsunamis usually have about three to five minutes of warning between when it is first noticed and when it reaches the beach. Anywhere between where the tsunami is noticed and the beach is will be devastated by the tsunami, You can’t take a boat out because the waves are too high. You can’t swim out because lungs compress much better than water does, not to mention that you’ll get knocked around like a ragdoll held by a playful dog. Anywhere that would be safe would have to be deep down, reached by some form or aerial transport, but planes take ages to get up and need a runway, while helicopters still take *three to five minutes* by experienced pilots
So the one misconception about tsunamis is that it’s a big wave face, so grab your surf board!!!
No.
It’s a rise of the level of the sea. If you’re standing on the beach and you have a decent size set coming in, and it rises you up 15 ft off the beach you were standing on, you’re prolly not going to have anything to hold on to when the wave recedes and takes you out to the ocean.
Also, if you are a little more inland, there can be a lot of debris in the water, causing injury.
[about halfway through this video](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mk68bZ701s0) you can see the first wave hitting Japan. No way to “dive under” the wave.
If you are out at sea deep sea a tsunami is not very high but a very wide and fast wave. A ship out there or someone in the water would barely notice it.
When the water gets shallower the wave gets higher and that is what you see when it hit land.
The wave still very long and can go inland many km with water and cover the ground with a couple of meters of water. It will sweep building that is not very strong and everyone else inland.
It will not be just the water on the top that moves inward but down to the bottom. Even if you could stay on the bottom the waves can be so wide that it takes a minute to pass above you.
So if you dive close to the shoe to escape it you will be swept in with the water, if you cant get to the surface you will drown. So the result is not significantly different if you fell in from a building still standing.
Just look at [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aLzg10Vzzw) where the water flows between the houses and sweep everything with it. If you dived in shallow water you would be swept in along all other debris.
You can compare a tsunami to was a regular wave of water. Compare it to what happens if a large dam collapse and a huge amount of water are released. That is likely a lot simpler to comprehend.
A tsunami isn’t a really tall wave that comes crashing down, like in the cartoons. It’s more like a long, deep surge of water that seems to never stop coming into shore.
You’re on the beach and you notice that the water is receding unusually far out, a lot faster than it would if it were the tide changing. Maybe the surface of the water is roiling and foamy. Then it changes and the water starts coming back into shore. Not much faster than a normal wave might come in, but the wave doesn’t stop and roll back again. It just keeps coming in, and coming in, and the sea level is rising behind it.
There is a mass of tons and tons of water that is going to push onto land and start flowing into buildings and down streets. It will pick up cars, break up houses, maybe uproot trees, and float them along and crash them into other things. You REALLY do not want to be swimming in that.
If you’re out at sea, though, a tsunami can pass by without you even noticing. It can feel like a slightly higher and wider wave than usual. You can swim in that no problem, though since you’re well away from shore you might as well stay in the boat.
Underwater is where the pressure is. A tsunami travels underwster and is pushed up as the depth decreases. This is why ships at sea are unaffected by tsunamis.
I imagine you could but you’d have to go way out to see first, then dive deep to avoid the wave.
You’re probably comparing this to diving under a wave or duck diving while surfing. A tsunami *is* a wave, but the entire body of water is moving.
Think of trying to “dive under” the water when you are at the top of a 20 ft wave. You can dive under, but the water you’re going down in to is going to keep moving too, so you’re not really buying yourself anything
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