Ingalls Weather on Nostr: Thursday’s tsunami warning highlights confusion that comes with some NWS alerts At ...
Thursday’s tsunami warning highlights confusion that comes with some NWS alerts
At 10:44 Pacific Time Thursday, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck off the coast of Northern California near Eureka. The strength of this earthquake prompted the National Tsunami Warning Center to issue a tsunami warning for a large area of the Pacific Coast of California and Oregon, including San Francisco.
Initial alerts regarding the earthquake and potential tsunami went out quickly with many people able to take action. Evacuation orders were issued in some San Francisco Bay Area neighborhoods and boaters along the coast took their vessels out to open water to mitigate damage risk.
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Thankfully, no damaging tsunami was observed and the warning was lifted at 11:54 Pacific Time. Significant confusion about whether or not a warning was in place arose about a half hour before this, however, and it was completely avoidable.
At 11:27 Pacific Time, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued an update to their tsunami information statement. Part of this message read:* THERE IS NO LONGER A TSUNAMI THREAT FROM THIS EARTHQUAKE.
This was quickly picked up on social media with people understandably posting that the tsunami warning had been cancelled and the risk was gone. The problem was this was issued by the tsunami warning center in Hawaii and not the one in Alaska.
The National Weather Service operates two tsunami warning centers – one in Honolulu, Hawaii and the other in Palmer, Alaska. The Alaska office is named the National Tsunami Warning Center while the Hawaii one is named the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. To avoid confusion, I will refer to these by the state they are in for this remainder of post.
The Alaska center is responsible for warning about tsunamis in Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and California. They also handle warnings for U.S. and Canadian shorelines along the Atlantic. Meanwhile, the Hawaii center is responsible for warning U.S. interests in the Pacific except for the West Coast. They also serve an advisory role for other Pacific rim nations.
When the Hawaii center stated there was no longer a tsunami threat, they were referring to there being no threat for their area of responsibility. In fact, the Hawaii center never issued a tsunami watch, warning, or advisory for this event.
The confusion in this notice was created by the Hawaii center not making it clear that they are not responsible for California and Oregon. The following text is provided at the bottom of their alert message, but it isn’t enough: * COASTAL REGIONS OF HAWAII... AMERICAN SAMOA... GUAM... AND CNMI SHOULD REFER TO PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER MESSAGES SPECIFICALLY FOR THOSE PLACES THAT CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.TSUNAMI.GOV. * COASTAL REGIONS OF CALIFORNIA... OREGON... WASHINGTON... BRITISH COLUMBIA AND ALASKA SHOULD ONLY REFER TO U.S. NATIONAL TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER MESSAGES THAT CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.TSUNAMI.GOV.
Shoving this to the bottom is not enough to give general readers notice that they aren’t talking about California or Oregon. Furthermore, the two centers share the same website and with the exception of one word have the same name.
The general public does not have much exposure to the National Weather Service’s tsunami warning centers and should not be expected to know this administrative nuance during a potential emergency.
Text stating that the message does not include California or Oregon should have been placed adjacent to the notice, not several lines beneath it. For half an hour between the Hawaii office’s notice and the Alaska office cancelling the warning social media was beginning to be filled with people quoting the line “there is no longer a tsunami threat from this earthquake.”
There was no damaging tsunami so this did not cause any issues, but had there been a tsunami and people were deciding to return to the hazard zone because of the Hawaii office’s message this would have been a significant problem.
It is kind of surprising to me that the alert is laid out this way. The National Weather Service generally does a good job of collaborating between offices. During severe weather events local offices communicate with national centers and each other to present a unified message.
This is not a piece meant to slander the people working to issue these alerts, but rather a call for meteorologists and others in the “hot seat” to remember that the general public doesn’t necessarily know or care about the difference between a local forecast office, regional centers, and national centers.
It is true that people should seek information from official sources during a potential emergency. With that said, the people at those official sources should also recognize the reality of how information spreads.
Adding one line of text would have completely avoided the confusion. If necessary, the software the National Weather Service uses should be updated but until then scientists issuing critical warnings should keep the public in mind.A tsunami alert sent to an iPhone. (Provided by @cynthiarose@sfba.social)
Further issues stem from how tsunami alerts (and weather alerts in general) are disseminated. The system the U.S. government uses to blast cell phones with weather and other geophysical alerts continues to send text messages based on county which creates an unnecessary false alarm effect.
Under the tsunami warning, this led to alerts being sent to phones at long distances from the hazard zone because of how large many counties are in the Western United States. One of the warned counties extends from the coast to the Cascades of Oregon, a distance of 115 miles (185 km).
Of course, the tsunami warning was only for coastal zones. People inland like this don’t need to be receiving emergency text message for coastal hazards.
The false alarm problem is not limited to tsunami messaging. When I lived in St. Anthony, Idaho, our county was about 60 miles (100 km) long from end to end. On the rare occasion that a tornado warning was issued anywhere in the county, we would get an emergency text message despite having never been placed in a tornado warning the whole time we lived there.
I knew, as a student meteorologist, to see what part of the county the tornado warning was for. Many other people also know to do this, but many people don’t. Like the issue with the two different tsunami warning centers, weather alerts should accommodate the understanding of the general population. We can’t expect to be understood by everyone but this feels like “low hanging fruit” for improvement.
Events like the earthquake and associated tsunami warning where there were no tsunami related deaths or damage are perfect opportunities to improve the system. Small changes can be made to the alert messages to avoid confusion in the future.
The issue with text alerts is admittedly a harder problem to solve. There are ways it can be fixed, though. One idea would be to only text out alerts to phones connected to cell towers inside or within five miles (8 km) of the alert area. The technology is there to do this. Some Midwestern counties utilize a similar method to determine what tornado sirens to activate during severe weather.
The tsunami warning centers and the text message emergency alerting system are critical, lifesaving infrastructure. The people who build and operate these systems do important work. These systems should be maintained but also improved to maximize efficiency and minimize confusion.Subscribe
The featured image is a tsunami evacuation sign in Seaside, Oregon. (M.O. Stevens/Wikimedia)
#Earthquake #NWS #sfba #tsunami
At 10:44 Pacific Time Thursday, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck off the coast of Northern California near Eureka. The strength of this earthquake prompted the National Tsunami Warning Center to issue a tsunami warning for a large area of the Pacific Coast of California and Oregon, including San Francisco.
Initial alerts regarding the earthquake and potential tsunami went out quickly with many people able to take action. Evacuation orders were issued in some San Francisco Bay Area neighborhoods and boaters along the coast took their vessels out to open water to mitigate damage risk.
Ingalls Weather thanks the support it gets from donors. Please consider making a small donation at this link to help me pay for the website and access to premium weather data.
Thankfully, no damaging tsunami was observed and the warning was lifted at 11:54 Pacific Time. Significant confusion about whether or not a warning was in place arose about a half hour before this, however, and it was completely avoidable.
At 11:27 Pacific Time, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued an update to their tsunami information statement. Part of this message read:* THERE IS NO LONGER A TSUNAMI THREAT FROM THIS EARTHQUAKE.
This was quickly picked up on social media with people understandably posting that the tsunami warning had been cancelled and the risk was gone. The problem was this was issued by the tsunami warning center in Hawaii and not the one in Alaska.
The National Weather Service operates two tsunami warning centers – one in Honolulu, Hawaii and the other in Palmer, Alaska. The Alaska office is named the National Tsunami Warning Center while the Hawaii one is named the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. To avoid confusion, I will refer to these by the state they are in for this remainder of post.
The Alaska center is responsible for warning about tsunamis in Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and California. They also handle warnings for U.S. and Canadian shorelines along the Atlantic. Meanwhile, the Hawaii center is responsible for warning U.S. interests in the Pacific except for the West Coast. They also serve an advisory role for other Pacific rim nations.
When the Hawaii center stated there was no longer a tsunami threat, they were referring to there being no threat for their area of responsibility. In fact, the Hawaii center never issued a tsunami watch, warning, or advisory for this event.
The confusion in this notice was created by the Hawaii center not making it clear that they are not responsible for California and Oregon. The following text is provided at the bottom of their alert message, but it isn’t enough: * COASTAL REGIONS OF HAWAII... AMERICAN SAMOA... GUAM... AND CNMI SHOULD REFER TO PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER MESSAGES SPECIFICALLY FOR THOSE PLACES THAT CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.TSUNAMI.GOV. * COASTAL REGIONS OF CALIFORNIA... OREGON... WASHINGTON... BRITISH COLUMBIA AND ALASKA SHOULD ONLY REFER TO U.S. NATIONAL TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER MESSAGES THAT CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.TSUNAMI.GOV.
Shoving this to the bottom is not enough to give general readers notice that they aren’t talking about California or Oregon. Furthermore, the two centers share the same website and with the exception of one word have the same name.
The general public does not have much exposure to the National Weather Service’s tsunami warning centers and should not be expected to know this administrative nuance during a potential emergency.
Text stating that the message does not include California or Oregon should have been placed adjacent to the notice, not several lines beneath it. For half an hour between the Hawaii office’s notice and the Alaska office cancelling the warning social media was beginning to be filled with people quoting the line “there is no longer a tsunami threat from this earthquake.”
There was no damaging tsunami so this did not cause any issues, but had there been a tsunami and people were deciding to return to the hazard zone because of the Hawaii office’s message this would have been a significant problem.
It is kind of surprising to me that the alert is laid out this way. The National Weather Service generally does a good job of collaborating between offices. During severe weather events local offices communicate with national centers and each other to present a unified message.
This is not a piece meant to slander the people working to issue these alerts, but rather a call for meteorologists and others in the “hot seat” to remember that the general public doesn’t necessarily know or care about the difference between a local forecast office, regional centers, and national centers.
It is true that people should seek information from official sources during a potential emergency. With that said, the people at those official sources should also recognize the reality of how information spreads.
Adding one line of text would have completely avoided the confusion. If necessary, the software the National Weather Service uses should be updated but until then scientists issuing critical warnings should keep the public in mind.A tsunami alert sent to an iPhone. (Provided by @cynthiarose@sfba.social)
Further issues stem from how tsunami alerts (and weather alerts in general) are disseminated. The system the U.S. government uses to blast cell phones with weather and other geophysical alerts continues to send text messages based on county which creates an unnecessary false alarm effect.
Under the tsunami warning, this led to alerts being sent to phones at long distances from the hazard zone because of how large many counties are in the Western United States. One of the warned counties extends from the coast to the Cascades of Oregon, a distance of 115 miles (185 km).
Of course, the tsunami warning was only for coastal zones. People inland like this don’t need to be receiving emergency text message for coastal hazards.
The false alarm problem is not limited to tsunami messaging. When I lived in St. Anthony, Idaho, our county was about 60 miles (100 km) long from end to end. On the rare occasion that a tornado warning was issued anywhere in the county, we would get an emergency text message despite having never been placed in a tornado warning the whole time we lived there.
I knew, as a student meteorologist, to see what part of the county the tornado warning was for. Many other people also know to do this, but many people don’t. Like the issue with the two different tsunami warning centers, weather alerts should accommodate the understanding of the general population. We can’t expect to be understood by everyone but this feels like “low hanging fruit” for improvement.
Events like the earthquake and associated tsunami warning where there were no tsunami related deaths or damage are perfect opportunities to improve the system. Small changes can be made to the alert messages to avoid confusion in the future.
The issue with text alerts is admittedly a harder problem to solve. There are ways it can be fixed, though. One idea would be to only text out alerts to phones connected to cell towers inside or within five miles (8 km) of the alert area. The technology is there to do this. Some Midwestern counties utilize a similar method to determine what tornado sirens to activate during severe weather.
The tsunami warning centers and the text message emergency alerting system are critical, lifesaving infrastructure. The people who build and operate these systems do important work. These systems should be maintained but also improved to maximize efficiency and minimize confusion.Subscribe
The featured image is a tsunami evacuation sign in Seaside, Oregon. (M.O. Stevens/Wikimedia)
#Earthquake #NWS #sfba #tsunami