Tidal Waves

Zepher
Chris & Lyn Darch
Sat 3 Oct 2009 18:44
Hi Folks,
 
Well it has been an eventful week, first we awoke to a Tsunami warning at seven o/c the subsea quake in Samoa had just occurred and the morning TV programme was speaking live to Samoan survivors, meanwhile they were pressing the Civil defence org here for the anticipated outcome here, a Tsunami warning had been issued and a surge of up to one metre was expected to hit the North Island at nine forty five, we immediately thought of Zephyr its as far north as you can get, whilst we have friend up there we guessed they would be in self survival mode.. nine forty five came and went, they evacuated all the low laying parts of the upper north island, that didn't stop people going to the beech ! and the surfers getting there boards out and getting into the sea ..all the ferries in Opua were Zephyr is put to sea and sat in the middle of the bay in deep water ..
 Well the big moment arrived and the most we got was a tidal surge in the rivers, its frightening though that ripple from the quake took three hrs to travel two thousand mile , which would have taken us in the boat twelve days !
 However the wall of water that hit Samoa was up to 8m in height, the surge also hit Tonga , some four hundred miles away, the smallest Island Nupatatos, thats its nick name , was devastated as the surge went right over the top of it ... it makes you think that this time last year we were in that area , and anchored in shallow water , we haven't heard anything from yachts we know were in the area so we hope they were in deeper water .
 It is difficult to fine out at the moment what happened in Lufuka were we were which is very low lying and if a surge of any height arrived there wouldn't be much place to hide as its a flat island .
 A lot of medical aid has been sent to Samoa and there's lots of news reel which I guess you guys have seen on the news .
 
That's all for now folks
 
The Weekly Noah's