Posts by BenWilson
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You're right that the final death toll will grow for a while yet, but it's unlikely to grow ten-fold.
Predictions like that are made to be broken. First report I heard was of 14 dead. A lot of the lag is around 'confirmed dead', rather than just 'missing'.
Samoa was fortunate in that the changeover from driving on the right to the left has meant the widespread deployment of police officers across the islands, so evacuation could be handled promptly.
I'm glad to hear that there is at least one happy coincidence.
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At least 40. I recall the way the death toll in 2004 continued to mount for several days afterwards - the first I heard it was somewhere around 25,000 people, by the end it was well over 200,000.
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If the tide goes out far enough they could just walk home.
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Hopefully that doesn't mean Raoul is 20 feet underwater right now so the signals can't get out...
That Tutukaka vid is pretty neat, although I have seen similar flows in estuaries at any half-tide. The problem is, if that is right now, the tide should be coming in.
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What's wrong with the good old fashioned English phrase Tidal Wave anyway? It's no more inaccurate than a Mexican Wave or a Brain Wave.
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You can't really use the "we get bigger storm tides than that" argument when it comes to these types of phenomena..... it's showing a bit more on the geonet gauges now so looks like intial wave arrival times were a bit out.
I was thinking much the same thing - the danger with Tsunami isn't how big the waves are, it's how unexpected they are, and how easily underestimated. 1m of surging water is plenty to drag people off their feet, bash them with debris, pin them under things, or drown them in confined spaces.
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Estimates are that wave height will be about a metre. Which is less than the volume of ordinary tidal change. Anywhere that's got a low tide is definitely safe. This includes Auckland city, which will be at dead low tide at 11:10.
Unless you happen to be wandering along the mud flats at the time?
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I've got sympathy for Germans feeling bitter about being stereotyped as Nazis constantly. Nazism was, after all, inflicted on Germany too. My German father-in-law was a small child during the war, his father killed in combat, his town destroyed by bombing, his youth spent in the care of the state. At 19 he left Germany to go to Australia, and was ruthlessly lampooned in every workplace, by other family members etc, for decades. He suffered especially because he has been unable to lose his accent and has highly stereotypical looks - light hair, a bullet head and blue eyes.
LOL, speak of the devil, he just called (from Australia) to warn me about the Tsunami.
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The damage in Samoa sounds significant.
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Any kiwis feeling smug about this shouldn't because for every horror methos of australian colonisation of the indigenous population there is a horror tale here in NZ against Maori.
Certainly there are horror tales against the Maori. But it's definitely not one-for-one. There was never anything remotely like the Black War and I'd challenge you to find any similar list of massacres of Maori.
None of which is to say that what happened to Maori was A-OK, just because other races got it harder. It's just hard to reconcile the two countries on this score (and I've lived in both) - Maori are to be found everywhere, all walks of life, all professions, sports, neighborhoods, etc. They are underrepresented in many areas, but they're certainly not unrepresented. Indeed, they were highly visible in many parts of Australia, where the Aboriginals were not.
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