Caribbean at risk for Tsunamis, Scientists confirm
By Ryan Haas
Reporter-SKNVibes.com
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BASSETERRE, St. Kitts- Some of the leading scientists in the field of Oceanography, Geology and Geophysics are speculating that the possibility of the Caribbean region experiencing a major tsunami in the eminent future “is only a matter of time”.
“A tsunami disaster is highly likely in the future as six damaging tsunamis have occurred in the last century. These are most likely to be more damaging than past events as the coastal areas are more developed,” asserts a University of the West Indies research report written by James Lander.
Lander goes on to document the near 2400 fatalities that tsunamis have caused throughout the Caribbean from 1692-1946, and concludes that “the current history is sufficient to indicate that there is a significant hazard from future tsunamis.”
Following the tragic loss of 230,000 lives in the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, some experts have said there has never been a greater need for an effective regional tsunami warning system in the Caribbean.
"The situation in the Indian Ocean was similar to the Caribbean. Nobody believed it would happen, but it happened," said Peter Koltermann, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (UNIOC), during a March 26th conference regarding coastal hazard warning systems. ~~Adz:Right~~
Koltermann, the thirteen Caribbean nations and the six regional organizations in attendance at the conference all concluded that a regional warning infrastructure similar to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre, which temporarily serves the Caribbean, must be put in place no later than 2010.
The warning system would be comprised of several early alert systems, such as earthquake and tidal monitors, as well as a variety of communications technologies to ensure that citizens of the Caribbean would have as much time as possible to head for higher ground during a deadly tsunami.
Tsunamis occur when large bodies of water, such as oceans, become rapidly displaced. This is often due to earthquake causing collisions between the tectonic plates that make up the surface of the Earth.
The Puerto Rico Oceanic Trench, which lies just north of the Federation and is a major subduction zone like the one that caused the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, has been the source of several geological and oceanographic studies for it potential to cause tsunami events.
"Our results indicate that great subduction zone earthquakes, which often occur in the deep trenches offshore, have the potential to add stress or trigger earthquakes on other faults on the nearby islands,” said Jian Lin, a senior scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute Geology and Geophysics Department. Jin speculates that these quakes would register 7.5 or more on the Richter Scale, substantially stronger than the earthquake that shook St. Kitts in November of 2007, and would make a major tsunami only a matter of time.
The council has yet to decide where such a centre would be located, with Barbados, Puerto Rico and Venezuela all being named as potential hosts. The UNIOC has planned another meeting in July to present its US $250,000 per year plan for the “technical, logistical and administrative requirements of a Regional Tsunami Warning Centre.”
