NW officials say tsunami protection insufficient
Tuesday, February 26, 2008 |
Blame feds for divurting funds
PORTLAND (AP) - After the killer Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, state officials in the Northwest thought the money Congress approved for tsunami preparations would help them gird for what could be the biggest natural disaster to hit the United States.
But Western states are now getting even less money than before. That's because, officials said, the federal government is diverting the cash for its own programs.
"It's a real slap in the face of a pretty good program that they're not getting that funding," said Jay Raskin, a City Council member in Cannon Beach who was part of a team that reviewed federal tsunami efforts.
Much of the federal tsunami money has gone toward warning buoys that would not help the West Coast in the case of the most serious tsunamis.
The buoys would be useful to warn Hawaii of the coming wave, but not the West Coast.
"The buoys find out about the tsunami about the time it hits shore," said George Priest, a geologist with the Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries.
The unusual struggle comes as new tsunami projections suggest that tsunamis likely to hit the West Coast could prove bigger than earlier estimates.
The state geologists of Oregon, Washington, California and Alaska last month sent a letter to their congressional delegations saying the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is defying Congress by keeping money for itself.
They said the federal actions will hamper their ability to produce evacuation maps for tsunamis, assist local communities with tsunami hazard mitigation projects, and continue tsunami hazard outreach and education.
U.S. Reps. David Wu and Darlene Hooley, both Oregon Democrats, plan to question the head of NOAA about the funds when he appears before their subcommittee today. Wu said NOAA shortchanged public preparedness by nearly $4.7 million in its 2008 budget.
"We will be asking tough questions about why these resources haven't been disbursed," said Joan Evans, Hooley's chief of staff.
Geologists estimate a roughly one-in-seven chance that a severe earthquake and tsunami will occur along the West Coast in the next 50 years.
David Green, tsunami program manager at NOAA, said federal officials are trying to balance state needs against the work of NOAA and other federal agencies. He said some money is going toward tsunami models that help officials know where to direct warnings.
"We're trying to work very closely on optimizing our plans and protection of U.S. citizens," he said.
The most serious risk comes from the Cascadia Subduction Zone, an undersea junction where one section of the Earths crust slides beneath another. Tension builds as the plates move, until they finally snap apart causing an earthquake and tsunami.
Such earthquakes typically happen every few hundred years the last one a magnitude 9 quake in 1700. Many experts believe the Oregon coast is poorly prepared for such a disaster.
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