Scientists are sounding the alarm about an extraordinary ‘mega tsunami’ that could submerge multiple US states and drown millions in minutes.
It’s all do to with the Cascadia Subduction Zone, one of North America’s most dangerous fault lines, which stretches nearly 600 miles from northern Vancouver Island in Canada to Cape Mendocino in California.
If a powerful earthquake occurs there, it could trigger a ‘Doomsday’ wave that would swamp much of the US West Coast, including Washington, Oregon, and northern California.
According to researchers at Virginia Tech, there is a 15 percent chance of a magnitude 8 or stronger quake along this fault within the next 50 years.
An earthquake is almost guaranteed to hit by 2100, the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, says.
If the Cascadia fault ruptures, scientists say the impact would be immediate and catastrophic.
Coastal land could sink more than six feet, and waves could tower to nearly 1,000 feet, dwarfing the height of ordinary tsunamis.
Buildings and roads would be submerged, and cities such as Seattle and Portland would be overwhelmed within minutes.
Ironically, experts say that the sooner the tsunami hits, the better, despite thousands of deaths being predicted in their models.
This is because the wave would be more devastating if sea levels continue to rise.
‘This is going to be a very catastrophic event for the US, for sure,’ the study’s lead author, Tina Dura, told BBC Science Focus.
‘The tsunami is going to come in, and it’s going to be devastating.’
A quake of magnitude 8 to 9 could create a 1,000-foot tsunami capable of crushing eight feet of the coastline and wiping out much of the West Coast.
But Ms Dura and her team warn that current tsunami maps of the region — which show areas that would potentially be affected by an earthquake-caused tsunami — do not take either rising sea levels into account or the ‘amplification effect it will have on future tsunamis.’
‘After the tsunami comes and eventually recedes, the land is going to persist at lower levels,’ Dura said.
‘That floodplain footprint is going to be altered for decades or even centuries.’
Such a quake could cause 5,800 deaths, and the resulting tsunami could claim another 8,000 lives, according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The last massive earthquake, magnitude 9, hit in January 1700 and triggered a tsunami that wiped out the village of Pachena Bay in British Columbia.
Scientists are now sounding the alarm, urging Trump’s administration to consider what they can do to mitigate disaster.
