The Next Tsunami: Living on a Restless Coast

Watching the horrific devastation of tsunamis in Southeast Asia, Chile, and Japan, it is easy to forget that the same outcome is possible along the coast of America’s Pacific Northwest. Henderson redresses this omission, focusing on Oregon’s swath of the Ring of Fire, that Pacific belt responsible for 90% of the world’s earthquakes. She begins with a tsunami that hit Seaside, Ore., in 1964, and follows the career of Tom Horning, then a boy in Seaside, whose life is interwoven with the story of the scientific realization that the Earth’s crust is made up of moving plates, something still hotly debated 50 years ago. Most Oregonians doubted that they were in danger until a combination of data from soil samples, historical records, and Native American oral traditions proved that in 1700 there had been a disastrous tsunami there. Today the existence of the Cascadia Subduction Zone is well-accepted, but remains such an intangible danger in the public mind that little preparation has been made for the inevitable tsunami. Henderson’s decision to weave a personal narrative into this work obscures the thrust of her argument. Nevertheless, that the West Coast of the U.S. is ill-prepared to deal with a major earthquake and tsunami comes through loud and clear. (Apr.)