Would the U.S. Tsunami Warning System Have Averted Indonesia’s Disaster?
Even the world’s best system “is really not a technological solution to the problem of a near-field tsunami.”
On Friday, an earthquake and tsunami struck the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia, flattening hotels, shopping malls, and hundreds of homes, and killing at least 1,200 people. The government expects the death toll to rise.
In the days after the quake, outsiders have focused on the failure of the local tsunami early-warning system. Many of the deaths occurred in Palu, a medium-sized city at the end of a long, skinny bay, nestled between mountains. of people were at the edge of that bay, enjoying themselves at a beach festival, when the water started rising. This scenario—beachgoers utterly ignorant of a tsunami at the very moment it struck—is exactly what early-warning systems are supposed to prevent. Why didn’t they work this time?
