TSUNAMI“El Peligro Olvidado” The Forgotten Danger !.pptVIP

A Risk-to-Life Assessment: The Very High Caribbean RiskUNESCO IOC/ICG Caribbean Tsunamis  San Juan, Puerto Rico, 11/29-30/06Bill Proenza, DirectorNational Hurricane CenterNational Weather ServiceMiami, FL Caribbean Overview “El Peligro Olvidado”, “The Forgotten Danger” …An appropriate Spanish characterization for a deadly phenomena with a disarming low frequency. Beaches are most vulnerable to loss of life. Just a 2-meter tsunami brings terribly high mortality near sea-level. The Caribbean’s lesson from the catastrophic Indian Ocean tsunami: despite tsunami infrequency, large coastal populations explosive tourism (attractive warm seas) results in a potential for enormous loss of life. A Caribbean Tsunami Warning Center is the pillar of an effective warning system and helps motivate multi-national commitment to preparedness and response ! Assessing Risk Assessing Actual Risk !We need to assess current vulnerability to determine actual risk. Thus we must add today’s population exposure to tsunami history and frequency to properly assess relative risks. Caribbean Tsunami Fatalities in the last 165 Years Caribbean Tsunamis Last major Western Atlantic basin tsunami event(s): August, 1946; lives lost: 1790 +75 = 1865* Since then, population shifts to Caribbean coastal communities and “explosive” tourism has taken place (USA alone has millions of citizens vacationing annually). Assessing risks based just on historical deaths, greatly understates today’s potential loss of life from Caribbean tsunamis. Despite coastal populations at risk being so much less in the past, we know at least 3503 lives* were lost in the Caribbean Basin since 1842 (165 years). Tsunami deaths since 1842 in two key areas, the northeastern Pacific (Alaska, Hawaii, West Coast States) the Caribbean Basin (includes Puerto Rico US Virgin Islands). The Caribbean basin with only 1/5 the area has 6x more deaths ! Most Caribbean tsunamis come from short-fused nearby sou