posted on December 30, 2004 01:05:22 PM new
Do you ever wonder how you got to be so lucky when there are others, like the tsunami victims, that are struggling to survive? Do you feel guilty sometimes?
posted on December 30, 2004 02:16:10 PM new
In a word.....no.
It is only the luck of the draw. Every time you get on a plane or drive your car you hope you make your trip in a safe manner but you just never know.
Enjoy life like it is your last moment on earth because you do not know when the moment comes when its time to leave this mortal coil.There is no reason or logic to any of it.
posted on December 30, 2004 02:23:45 PM new
Also no.
You never know when your own life could take a major turn for the worse. I feel sadness and concern for the tsunami victims, but I am not in any way "guilty".
--------------------------------------
Replay Media - The best source for board games, card games and miniatures on the web!
posted on December 30, 2004 03:42:27 PM new
Feel guilty. No.
Feel for the victims, yes.
Seeing a headline that had 'Supermodel is recoving in hopital after tsuami' makes me sick, when the people that live and work there are homeless, jobless, dying, having family dead or dying, and every bad thing imaginable happening!
We just got back from our little getaway. One night in a hotel-casino, he turns on the news and there we sat, watching these stories from over there, that I felt so bad, it was hard to sleep. But feel guilty? no, we could have the SAME thing happen here, in fact that was my Netscape headline.... A TSUAMI warning for the West Coast! California, Oregon, WA, and B.C.
posted on December 30, 2004 04:50:16 PM new
Here is the story of my homepage of Netscape news.
Earth changes are happening all the time, and they will, at some point hit this continent
I'm not sure this link will work here, its for netscape, and I know most use IE
Tsunami scientists and public safety officials are closely watching an earthquake-prone nation with thousands of miles of crowded coastlines for signs of an imminent disaster. Indonesia? Japan? Try the United States.
Experts say the West Coast could experience a calamity similar to the one they have been watching unfold half a world away.
``People need to know it could happen,'' said geologist Brian Atwater of the U.S. Geological Survey.
Scientists say grinding geologic circumstances similar to those in Sumatra also exist just off the Pacific Northwest coast. They are a loaded gun that could trigger a tsunami that could hit Northern California, Washington, Oregon and British Columbia in minutes - too fast for the nation's deep-sea tsunami warning system to help.
In fact, Atwater said there was a 9.0 earthquake under the Pacific more than 300 years ago that had devastating consequences. He and other scientists last year reported finding evidence of severe flooding in the Puget Sound area in 1700, including trees that stopped growing after ``taking a bath in rising tide waters.''
The danger rests just 50 miles off the West Coast in a 680-mile undersea fault known as the Cascadia subduction zone that behaves much like one that ruptured off Sumatra. The 1700 quake occurred along the Cascadia fault.
Scientists say a giant rupture along the fault would cause the sea floor to bounce 20 feet or more, setting off powerful ocean waves relatively close to shore. The first waves could hit coastal communities in 30 minutes or less, according to computer models.
Seattle; Vancouver, British Columbia; and other big cities in the region probably would be relatively protected from deadly flooding because of their inland locations. But other, smaller communities could be devastated.
And while buildings in the United States are far more solid than the shacks and huts that were obliterated in some of Asia's poor villages, few structures could withstand nearby tremors as powerful as those that occurred Sunday in Sumatra.
Moreover, such a quake would be way too close to shore for the nation's network of deep-sea wave gauges to be of any help.
Even in the case of quakes happening farther out in the Pacific or in Alaska, the U.S. warning system might not be adequate.
The network - which consists of six deep-sea instruments in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and Hawaii and near the equator off the coast of Peru - is thin and scattered, and at least two of the gauges in Alaska are not even reporting daily wave readings. Also, predicting where a tsunami is likely to come ashore cannot be done with the kind of precision seen in hurricane forecasts.
Eddie N. Bernard, who directs the network for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said the six sensors are the ``bare minimum'' for adequate warning. He said there are plans to expand the system to 20 sensors in the next five years, including 10 gauges for the seismically active Aleutian Islands.
Whether the continental United States is vulnerable to tsunamis from Asian earthquakes is another question. Hawaii and parts of Alaska certainly are exposed, but whether earthquake fault lines in Japan and Southeast Asia are oriented in the right directions to send tsunamis all they way to the Lower 48 states is debatable.
As for the Atlantic Coast, a tsunami is considered extremely unlikely.
Some computer models suggest East Coast cities are vulnerable to a large tsunami if there were a huge volcanic eruption and landslide in the Canary Islands, off northwest Africa. But other researchers say such an event would happen only once in 10,000 years, and such a disruption is unlikely to occur all at once.
posted on December 30, 2004 06:42:57 PM new
Classic, don't be fooled. Near's trying to find out how old I am again by asking if I lived B.C. I'm not falling for it!
No Near, but Kiara does and I haven't seen her around lately. I wish she would just pop in to say hi. Thanks for the article. Are you in Oregon or Washington? (Sorry, I forget.)
And OK, maybe guilty isn't the right word, but when I watch all of this all I can think about is how lucky I am and that makes me feel guilty-ish. The number of people that have died is still growing too.
posted on December 31, 2004 09:38:50 AM new
replay! thank you very much! LOL
classic-ROTFL!
kraft, I'm in WA on Puget Sound. If a tsunami hit, it would be the ocean side, I believe, I know when we go to the ocean, they have tsunami evacuation route signs posted everywhere, but I don't think people could make it out in a few minutes!
Classic, do they call it Social Security in Canada?
posted on December 31, 2004 10:34:49 AM new
Nope. The birth rate in that part of the world approaches that of cockroaches. They can make more. They're struggling to survive on a good day.
__________
The Democrats were rejected by a majority of Americans
posted on December 31, 2004 12:16:14 PM new
Near-ahh dont know-but since Kraft has two citizenships, Im wondering if shes collecting in both countries.
posted on December 31, 2004 03:21:50 PM new
Near, a friend of ours daughter & son in law just bought a house just there in Seattle half way between between Puget Sound and Lake Washington, I believe its on E 15th? A word to the wise ain't necessary, it's the stupid ones that need the advice."
- Bill Cosby
