Tsunamis in the Indian Ocean

CJvR · Post by **CJvR** » 2004-12-26 12:37pm

Old Plympto wrote:Any idea what the figures were in terms of human lives lost when Kratatoa blew up south of Sumatra?

IIRC about 30.000 mainly from tsunamis.

Admiral Valdemar · Post by **Admiral Valdemar** » 2004-12-26 12:39pm

Old Plympto wrote: Any idea what the figures were in terms of human lives lost when Kratatoa blew up south of Sumatra?

The Krakatoa eruption killed some 36,000.

This incident is nowhere near that and hopefully it won't ever be. But this is shocking and coming at such a time of the year as well when a lot of people go abroad to have a holiday in the sun for Christmas.

CJvR · Post by **CJvR** » 2004-12-26 03:02pm

Latest figure 12.000 and still rising...

Dartzap · Post by **Dartzap** » 2004-12-26 03:42pm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4125481.stm

Thats a damn huge area of effect...

irishmick79 · Post by **irishmick79** » 2004-12-26 03:51pm

Wholy Christ, this looks bad. My sympathies go out to the victims of this regional tragedy....

Post by **Edi** » 2004-12-26 04:14pm

Spent the day at my parents' place, and damn, just learned that some friends of the family had left for Sri Lanka this morning. Fortunately they were in the air instead of on the ground, so they're okay. Just had their holiday plans fucked up, but that's a small concern. My cousin's mom was also in the PhiPhi island rsort in Thailand just two weeks ago.

Edi

Post by **weemadando** » 2004-12-26 04:24pm

Yeah, it appears that the quake near Sumatra was the fifth biggest of the past 100 years (8.8 on open ended Richter last I heard), and was also related to the 8.1 level quake that woke me up the other morning with an epicentre near Macquarie island.

As for massive amounts of casualties from the tsunamis, the quake couldn't have picked a better spot - shallow water, enough room to build power without getting too the point where they start to lose power and plenty - and I mean PLENTY of islands and coastlines that they can impact.

Its sounding worse and worse though - looks like lots of Australian reservists might well be getting called up for humanitarian relief duty.

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2004-12-26 04:29pm

Its the biggest earthquake since the 1964 9.4 alaskan quake, and the 5th largest since 1900. You get quakes this big when you have the massive fault zones like you do in the Australian-Indo-Asian plate junction. The reason the damage is so widespread, even for this magnitude, is that the fault failed over such a large scale. Usually you have slips and breaks along tens of kilometers, but something like this is extremely rare. Unfortunately, this means you'll also have more aftershocks over a larger area.

Geo-info:
*The average height for a seismic-generated tsunami is 10 meters, due to seafloor properties.
*Largest quake in continental US was magnitude 8.8 in New Madrid, Kentucky. That quake knocked buildings over in New Orleans and New York.
*Largest quake in US history was 9.2 that struck Prince William Sound, Alaska on Good Friday, March 28, 1964. It caused a catastrophic collapse of a mountainside into a bay and created a 120 foot tsunami.
*Largest quake in world history was a magnitude 9.5 (Mw) in Chile on May 22, 1960.
*You can't create a magnitude 10 earthquake without an asteroid.

Further geo-questions need only ask.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-12-26 04:33pm

9.2 or 9.4 in Alaska?

Dartzap · Post by **Dartzap** » 2004-12-26 04:35pm

9.2, if i read that correctly

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2004-12-26 04:35pm

I checked 2 different sources and got 2 different answers. We're in the process of revising the richter magnitude to a different system, so little errors like that appear. Sorry.

Howedar · Post by **Howedar** » 2004-12-26 04:43pm

S'ok, I was just curious.

kheegster · Post by **kheegster** » 2004-12-26 10:15pm

Has anyone heard from KAN? Does he live in Sumatra or Java?

CJvR · Post by **CJvR** » 2004-12-27 12:18am

Latest figure 13.700 and counting.

RedImperator · Post by **RedImperator** » 2004-12-27 12:25am

Lord Poe wrote:Damn, I've never heard of this level of disaster before, in that region. Is this unprecidented?

Not in the least. There have been several cyclones that slammed right into Bangladesh and killed hundreds of thousands of people, primarily by drowning. Speaking of which, what have the casualties been like there?

Wicked Pilot · Post by **Wicked Pilot** » 2004-12-27 12:31am

Lonestar wrote:It's a dirty Job, but someone has to do it. I hear they're evacuating what's left of Phuket.

Sounds like a job for the Herc.

Lilith · Post by **Lilith** » 2004-12-27 12:39am

I'm watching CNN and they just reported that the waves reached the coast of Somalia. Warnings were issued and although some areas were evacuated high waves hit and some were swept away. No specific number on casualites but it probably will not reach the rate of Southeast Asia. This is unbelievably vast.

CJvR · Post by **CJvR** » 2004-12-27 12:39am

RedImperator wrote:Speaking of which, what have the casualties been like there?

For a change Bangladesh seems to have got off lightly.

The main quake have been upgraded to a 9,0. There seems to have been a whole serie of quakes along the entire faultline ranging from 5,8 to the first big one at 9,0.

Lonestar · Post by **Lonestar** » 2004-12-27 02:24am

Just because I haven't seend or heard anything about it, I wonder how Diego Garcia made out.

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-12-27 02:35am

Lilith wrote:I'm watching CNN and they just reported that the waves reached the coast of Somalia. Warnings were issued and although some areas were evacuated high waves hit and some were swept away. No specific number on casualites but it probably will not reach the rate of Southeast Asia. This is unbelievably vast.

Nine deaths reported in Somalia, which means there are more, since the government has no power to even do rescue work or get an accurate tally. No reports from the Seychelles yet, though Kenya also has fatalities. The only international airport in the Maldives has been knocked out and up to 2,000 islands are without communication. There are reports of bridges washed out in southern Burma but the government is refusing to release casualty figures.

The death toll now stands at 15,925, with at least 5,000 killed in India alone, and the death toll in Sri Lanka having exceeded 6,000. Another 2,000 people are "feared dead" in the Andamans and Nicobars and 1,500 "missing" in Sri Lanka as well. Furthermore, the death toll from Indonesia (4,500) is only from Aceh Province. There were other provinces effected but only Aceh has reported so far.

There are only nine reported dead in Bangladesh so far, but I am very worried because that entire country is basically a flood plain and it's so tremendously crowded. Burma, likewise, could have a high death toll. In all liklihood the number of fatalities has already exceeded 20,000 and will simply go higher as people are faced with famine and disease.

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-12-27 02:47am

Latest update: The death toll in Tamil Nadu State has gone up from 1,725 to 2,500, meaning an additional 775 deaths added on to my earlier figure.

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2004-12-27 02:50am

FUCK!

Just got the word that one of my co workers was on Phi-Phi iland when the tsunami hit.

No one knows if he is alive or dead but everyone is expecting the worst

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-12-27 02:55am

Faram wrote:FUCK!

Just got the word that one of my co workers was on Phi-Phi iland when the tsunami hit.

No one knows if he is alive or dead but everyone is expecting the worst :(

The death in Thailand has gone up from 425 to 700. Additionally to earlier figures, there are at least 1,200 missing in Andhra Pradesh State, India.

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-12-27 03:00am

Latest reports from India are replacing 2,000 "feared dead" (I included them in the missing column) in the Andamans and Nicobars with "nearly 2,000 killed".

The Duchess of Zeon · Post by **The Duchess of Zeon** » 2004-12-27 03:14am

Death toll in Sri Lanka now up by another 450, not sure if that bites into the 1500 missing figure or just increases it overall. I'm browsing through just about every news site on Google news and refreshing every few minutes, and every time I do that, the death toll increases in some place or another.