Pacific Tsunami Warning Center In Hawaii

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Imagine being one of these guys at NOAA getting this alarm and having no idea who to call ...

Indian Ocean Tsunami Timeline from NOAA

NOAA AND THE INDIAN OCEAN TSUNAMI

NOAA

TriCities.com

Dec 29, 8:28 PM EST

Dec. 29, 2004 - NOAA scientists at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii went to work within minutes of getting a seismic signal that an earthquake occurred off the west coast of Northern Sumatra, Indonesia. NOAA issued a bulletin indicating no threat of a tsunami to Hawaii, the West Coast of North America or to other coasts in the Pacific Basin-the U.S. area of responsibility. (Click NOAA image for larger view of tsunami buoy being deployed in the Pacific Ocean from the NOAA ship Ronald H. Brown. Please credit “NOAA.”)

NOAA scientists then began an effort to notify countries about the possibility that a tsunami may have been triggered by the massive 9.0 undersea earthquake. The Pacific Basin tsunami warning system did not detect a tsunami in the Indian Ocean since there are no buoys in place there. Even without a way to detect whether a tsunami had formed in the Indian Ocean, NOAA officials tried to get the message out to other nations not a part of its Pacific warning system to alert them of the possibility of a tsunami. However, the tsunami raced across the ocean at speeds up to 500 mph. Below is the timeline of agency's actions once the undersea earthquake was detected by the NOAA Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii.

(All times listed below are Hawaii Standard Time or HST.)

At 2:59 p.m. Hawaii Standard Time (HST) on Christmas Day a large earthquake occurred in the Indian Ocean near Sumatra, Indonesia.

At 3:07 p.m. the resulting seismic signals received at the NOAA Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) from stations in Australia triggered an alarm that alerted watchstanders.

At 3:10 p.m. PTWC issued a message to other observatories in the Pacific with its preliminary earthquake parameters.

At 3:14 p.m. PTWC issued a bulletin providing information on the earthquake and stating there was no tsunami threat to the Pacific nations that participate in the Tsunami Warning System in the Pacific (ITSU). These member nations are part of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) and the International Coordination Group for the Tsunami Warning System in the Pacific (ICG/ITSU). India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives are not part of the Pacific system.

At 4:04 p.m. PTWC issued bulletin No. 2 revising the earthquake magnitude to 8.5. That bulletin stated no tsunami threat to the Pacific but identified the possibility of a tsunami near the epicenter. No additional information regarding the formation of a tsunami was available.

At approximately 4:30 p.m. HST PTWC attempted to contact the Australia Met Service with no luck but were successful in contacting Australia Emergency Management. They confirmed they were aware of the earthquake.

At approximately 5:30 p.m. Internet newswire reports of casualties in Sri Lanka provided PTWC with the first indications of the existence of a destructive tsunami. Indications are that the tsunami had already struck the entire area by this time, although we have not been able to obtain arrival times.

At approximately 5:45 p.m., armed with knowledge of a tsunami, PTWC contacted the U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM) in Hawaii.

At approximately 5:45 p.m., PTWC received a call from a Sri Lanka Navy Commander inquiring about the potential for further tsunami waves from aftershocks.

At approximately 6:00 p.m. the U.S. Ambassador in Sri Lanka called PTWC to set up a notification system in case of big aftershock. He said they would contact Sri Lanka Prime Minister's office for such notifications.

Continuing news reports gave increasing and more widespread casualties.

At approximately 7:25 p.m. the first reading from the Australian National Tidal Center gauge at Cocos Island west of Australia gave a reading of 0.5m crest-to-trough.

At 7:25 p.m. the Harvard University Seismology Department reported its preliminary Centroid Moment Tensor solution that indicated a magnitude of 8.9.

At approximately 7:45 p.m. PTWC contacted the Australia Bureau of Meteorology and advised them about the increased earthquake magnitude and the 0.5m reading at Cocos Island, as well as the possibility of a destructive tsunami impact on Australia's west coasts.

At approximately 8:00 p.m. PTWC re-contacted PACOM to advise of increased earthquake magnitude and potential for further tsunami impacts in the western Indian Ocean.

At approximately 8:15 p.m. Australia Bureau of Met called PTWC to advise they had issued an alert to their west coast.

At approximately 8:20 p.m. NOAA National Weather Service Pacific Region director contacted PTWC to report PACOM said no tsunami was observed at Diego Garcia in the Pacific.

At approximately 10:15 p.m. PTWC spoke with U.S. State Department Operations and advised them about the potential threat to Madagascar and Africa. They set up a conference call with the U.S. embassies at Madagascar and Mauritius, and PTWC advised them of the situation.

At 5:36 a.m. on December 27 PTWC issued a third Tsunami Information Bulletin for this event informing the Pacific that small sea level fluctuations from the Indian Ocean tsunami were being observed in the Pacific, probably from energy that wrapped around south of Australia.

The Pacific Warning System

Pacific warning network is comprised of (1) hundreds of seismic stations worldwide; (2) coastal tide gauges and sophisticated Deep-ocean Assessment and Reporting of Tsunamis (DART) buoys in the Pacific Basin capable of detecting a centimeter's difference in ocean height.

However, it is important to note that without similar gauges and buoys in the Indian Ocean PTWC officers were not in a position to detect a tsunami there.

NOAA's Responsibility to the International Community

The U.S. has demonstrated the effectiveness of its warning system within the Pacific region. It has also demonstrated that the warning system can provide initial earthquake information to other nations and is most willing to share that information with all concerned. With national dissemination and water level networks in place, NOAA’s information can be used to mitigate future disasters.

It is also important to recognize that tsunamis can come ashore within minutes of nearby earthquakes. In those instances, people must know what to do in the event of a "felt" earthquake in low lying coastal areas.

The need for a tsunami warning program outside the Pacific region has been raised since 1985 with little result. It now appears that there is new interest in this issue within the international ICG/ITSU community. The U.S. strongly supports such an effort.

Furthermore, the development of the Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS) led by the United States, Japan, South Africa and the European Commission-with 53 nations currently participating at the ministerial level-should help fill the sensor gap for other regions of the world. Two key focus areas of the GEOSS initiative are addressing "reducing loss of life and property due to disasters" and "monitoring our oceans."