Category Archives: coastal hazards

OPB’s “Unprepared:” Are we ready for the Big One?

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“Unprepared,” a special edition of Oregon Public Broadcasting’s Oregon Field Guide series airing Oct 1, examines whether Oregonians are ready for the magnitude 8 or stronger earthquake scientists are predicting for the offshore Cascadia Subduction Zone within the next .

The program looks at what it takes to get ready for a disaster of that scope – and the potential consequences if we don’t.

Oregon Sea Grant’s coastal hazards specialist, Patrick Corcoran, is among the experts who contributed to the program. Corcoran is accustomed to talking people through preparedness, from how families can create a “Quake Kit” of supplies that can be grabbed at the first sign of earthquake to how entire coastal communities can – and should – relocate critical facilities such as hospitals and schools from the likely path of the devastating tsunami that likely would accompany such a quake.

“Unprepared” is part of a year-long initiative by OPB and Oregon Field Guide to inform people about the dangers of a megaquake, and to examine ways that our region can be better prepared for such a disaster. Visit the OPB Website for more information.

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Cascadia earthquake: Finding the sweet spot between fear and action

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A recent national news article suggesting that everything in Oregon west of Interstate-5 “would be toast” in a major Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake certainly drew attention to the seismic reality facing the Pacific Northwest.

The concern, though, is that people are focusing on the most draconian or extreme scenarios, experts say, which can lead to a sense of fatalism. The reaction illustrates the state of earthquake and tsunami preparedness – or lack thereof – in the United States, said Patrick Corcoran, Oregon Sea Grant’s Astoria-based coastal hazards specialist, who works with coastal communities on disaster preparedness.

It’s a matter of feast or famine.

“The Cascadia Subduction Zone has shifted from a science project to a social studies project,” Corcoran said. “We need to find a sweet spot between fear and action. What I try to do is temper the tendency of people to toggle between the poles of ‘it won’t happen here’ and ‘it will be so bad that there’s no use worrying about it.’”

(Read the entire story from OSU News & Research Communication to learn how Corcoran and other OSU faculty are working with the state and coastal communities to prepare people, communities and infrastructure for a Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake and tsunami).

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Earthquake and tsunami preparedness material from Oregon Sea Grant:

Japanese fish found off Oregon; 2011 tsunami link possible

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Striped Knifefish

The striped knifejaw caught off Port Orford in veterinary quarantine tank at HMSC

NEWPORT – Oregon scientists, including specialists from Oregon Sea Grant, are examining an unusual fish hauled out of the ocean near Port Orford in a crab pot last week for possible connections to the 2011 Japanese tsunami.

The fish, an Oplegnathus fasciatus (sometimes called a barred knifejaw or striped beakfish) is in quarantine at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, under the care of OSG aquatic veterinarian Tim Miller-Morgan.

While it’s hard to say whether the fish was transported across the Pacific by debris from the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan, its appearance in US waters raises questions, according to OSU’s John Chapman, an aquatic invasive species specialist based at the Hatfield Center.

Sea Grant invasive species expert Sam Chan estimates the fish to be around 1-2 years old, which makes it unlikely the animal left Japan in 2011. But, he added, “a boat could have been milling around Asian waters for the past 2-3 years and then picked up the fish and ridden the currents over. The big question is – are there more of these.” He said Sea Grant would work with Oregon commercial fisherman, crabbers and others to keep a lookout for more of the species.

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Videos of Critical Issues in Adapting to Climate Change

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Crashing waves

A set of three short videos highlights some critical issues related to climate change at the Oregon coast. Those issues are flagged by the video titles:

How Soon Do We Have to Think Differently?

. . . How Should We Adapt?

. .  and the overarching goal of having Community Resilience.

The videos, intended primarily for those involved in or concerned about the issues that adapting to climate change presents for coastal areas, were produced by Oregon Sea Grant with the cooperation of a range of climate researchers and coastal professionals who are interviewed on camera. The themes of the videos emerged from surveys, interviews, and workshops conducted by Sea Grant and partners in the last few years.

Coastal professionals in other states, as well as in Oregon, may find the perspectives and insights of these videos useful or provocative.

In addition to the high definition versions on Vimeo.com linked above, the same videos are on YouTube, where closed captioning is available:

 How Soon Do We Have to Think Differently?

How Should We Adapt?

Community Resilience  (Neskowin, Oregon, is the focus.)

NB: The URL for the last video above has been corrected (1/28/15)

 

 

Sea Grant expert featured on National Geographic tsunami special

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Pat Corcoran visits Japan to see aftermath of tsunami, 2012Patrick Corcoran, Oregon Sea Grant’s coastal hazards specialist, along with OSU researchers Chris Goldfinger and Tuba Ozkan-Haller are featured in “The Next Mega Tsunami,” a new TV special scheduled for its US premiere on the National Geographic Channel this coming Friday, Dec. 26.

The program is scheduled to air at 9 pm Pacific Time; check local listings for possible changes.

The special commemorates the 1oth anniversary of the 2004 Indian Ocean undersea megathrust earthquake which sent a devastating tsunami hurtling into Indonesia and the south Asian coastlines, killing an estimated 230,000 people in fourteen countries.

Seismic researchers – including OSU’s Goldfinger – say geologic conditions off the Oregon coast make it vulnerable to similar megathrust in the region known as the Cascadia Subduction Zone. The geologic and historic record shows that such “megathrust” quakes have occurred at regular intervals throughout the planet’s history, and scientists say the region is overdue for another.

Corcoran, who is based in Astoria, has worked for years with the state of Oregon and coastal communities to help develop local tsunami inundation maps, community and individual tsunami preparedness plans, and to help communities increase their resilience against such disasters by consider the relocation of hospitals, schools and other critical or vulnerable facilities to higher ground.

Ozkan-Haller, a professor of geology with OSU’s College of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, specializes in predicting how near-shore waves behave along coastlines, a field which has led her into tsunami-related research at OSU’s Hinsdale Wave Research Lab.

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New app will help coastal Oregon prepare for tsunami

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Hatfield Marine Science Center employees practice their tsunami evacuation route (photo courtesy of Maryann Bozza, HMSC)

Hatfield Marine Science Center employees practice their tsunami evacuation route (photo courtesy of Maryann Bozza, HMSC)

Tsunami preparedness will soon be coming to a smartphone near you. A team of researchers at Oregon State University is developing an app for coastal residents to plan – and test – evacuation routes to use during an earthquake and tsunami.

Participants will use the app to conduct actual evacuation drills and compare their response time to the speed of an incoming wave.

“People will be able to download the app, plug in their start points and end points, and be able to track that like a GPS,” explained Lori Cramer, a sociologist and principal investigator on the project, which is funded by Oregon Sea Grant. “They will be able to do it themselves to see how quickly they can get to wherever they are going and try alternate routes.”

Social media was underutilized during the Fukushima disaster in Japan, but Cramer hopes that with proper planning this app will help save lives when a disaster does hit Oregon. Studies of seismic risk in the Pacific Northwest have estimated that the Oregon coast has a more than one-in-three chance of experiencing a major, arthquake, capable of generating a dangerous tsunami, within the next 50 years.

Along with the app, the team plans workshops on the coast to discuss evacuation routes and preparedness. After residents practice an evacuation using the app, they will complete an anonymous survey to help the researchers compare trends and disaster preparedness between coastal cities.

“The app can be used to relay evacuation route and time data to a central archive,” explained Haizhong Wang, a civil engineer and collaborator on the project. “These data are used by city managers and the research team to guide future development of evacuation simulation models with thousands of people.”

To use the app, participants create a profile including age, gender and zip code—to distinguish residents from tourists—and head out for high ground. Hitting the “start” button signals an earthquake, and all of their decisions afterwards are of interest to the researchers.

“One thing that we are interested in is ‘milling time,’ or how long it takes a person to decide to evacuate after feeling the earthquake,” Cramer said.

Throughout the dry run, participants will actually be able to monitor how close the imaginary wave is to their current location.

“We have pre-computed tsunami inundation for several areas, and we are working on Newport now,” said Dan Cox, an engineer and professor with OSU’s School of Civil and Construction Engineering who is creating the wave models for the project. “You can use this pre-computed inundation to get an idea of where the water will be at any given time.”

While the app is being developed, the team continues to conduct evacuation drills with various “at-risk” groups—including the elderly, disabled and the poor— along the coast. Cramer says that these trainings can provide hope to people who might not evacuate otherwise.

“There was one elderly lady who hadn’t planned on leaving,” Cramer said. “But she did the drill and she found out that she could make it to the evacuation point in the time period, and that changed her whole outlook on life.”

Once the app is released, the research team plans to create an interactive display at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport for visitors to learn about the technology and provide feedback. Ultimately, the researchers hope to use social media and education to help make coastal communities more resilient and better prepared for future disasters.

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… about Oregon Sea Grant’s work on tsunami preparedness on the Oregon coast

Confluence: Oregon communities respond to climate change

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Confluence cover

Cover by artist Earl Newman

Climate change: Some people feel overwhelmed by it, others argue about it. Oregon Sea Grant researchers, Extension specialists and communicators, meanwhile are working to better understand what a changing climate is already doing to the ocean and coast – and helping coastal communities better prepare themselves for higher and more damaging waves, stronger storms, rising sea level and other anticipated changes.

The latest issue of OSG’s Confluence magazine examines some of the issues coastal Oregon faces, and ways in which Sea Grant is helping citizens and scientists address them, from anticipating the effects of climate change to building resilience in the face of them – and better understanding how people with different backgrounds and philosophies can even communicate about the topic.

Other articles in this issue include

  • Profiles of several Oregon Sea Grant Scholars, and how their student experiences in Sea Grant internships and fellowships helped prepare them for careers in marine science and public policy
  • A new app that helps coastal visitors identify critters they find on the beach – and contribute to citizen science by reporting them.
  • A study of how juvenile Dungeness crab move through coastal waters as they mature, and an exhibit at the Hatfield Marine Science Center that explains what scientists are learning, and how it might benefit the crab fishery.

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Dark Horse releases new comic about earthquake preparedness

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Without Warning comic coverDark Horse Comics, the Oregon-based publisher of such iconic titles as Star Wars, Sin City and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, has teamed with the Oregon Office of Emergency Management and the Cascadia Region Earthquake  Group to produce a new, free comic about earthquake preparedness.

Without Warning tells the story of a girl who lives on the Oregon Coast and is trying to reunite with her family after a major Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake. The digital version of the 16-page, full-color comic, written for audiences age 12 and up, can be downloaded free from Dark Horse; free printed copies are available from the Office of Emergency Management.

Oregon is located in the Cascadia Subduction Zone, a 600 hundred mile earthquake fault stretching from offshore Northern California to Southern British Columbia. Experts predict a large 9.0 or higher earthquake could strike Oregon at any time. Oregon Sea Grant, through its coastal natural hazards program, works to help coastal towns and residents prepare for the Big One.

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Tsunami Preparedness Week – Are You Prepared?

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Pat Corcoran visits Japan to see aftermath of tsunami, 2012It’s Tsunami Preparedness Week, and Pat Corcoran wants to make sure people who live on -and visit – the seismically active coast know what to do when the big wave hits.

Corcoran, Oregon Sea Grant’s coastal hazards specialist, is featured this week on the NOAA Sea Grant home page, and says the single most important thing to know about tsunamis is that they can happen unexpectedly. “Whenever visiting the ocean shore, be prepared to move to high ground if you experience an earthquake,” says Corcoran. “Also important to know, is the earthquake and tsunami experience is different depending on where you are in the world. In the Pacific Northwest of the USA, our natural warning for a big tsunami is a big earthquake.” Elsewhere in the world, people may not even feel the ground shake.

Corcoran has spent more than a decade educating and working with coastal residents and communities to help them prepare for coastal hazards, from storms to the inevitability that a large earthquake – likely with an accompanying tsunami – will strike the region in the not-too-distant future. The challenge, he says, is getting people to understand that they need to prepare now for an event that has never happened in their lifetimes, or perhaps those of their parents or grandparents.

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Sea Grant survey: Coastal professionals, managers concerned about climate change

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High surf at Fishing RockThe American public may be divided over whether climate is changing, but coastal managers and elected officials in nine states say they see the change happening—and believe their communities will need to adapt.

That’s one finding from a NOAA Sea Grant research project, led by Oregon Sea Grant and involving multiple other Sea Grant programs, which surveyed coastal leaders in selected parts of the nation’s Atlantic, Pacific, Gulf and Great Lakes coasts, as well as Hawaii.

Three quarters of coastal professionals surveyed – and 70% of all participants – said they believe that the climate in their area is changing—a marked contrast to results of some national surveys of the broader American public which have found diverse and even polarized views about climate change and global warming.

The Sea Grant survey was developed to understand what coastal/resource professionals and elected officials think about climate change, where their communities stand in planning for climate adaptation and what kinds of information they need, said project leader Joe Cone, assistant director of Oregon Sea Grant.  Sea Grant programs in Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois-Indiana, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Oregon, and Washington—states that represent most of NOAA’s coastal regions—took part, administering the survey at various times between January 2012 and November 2013.

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