Thread: Pacific Tsunami Alert

A tsunami warning has been issued for the Pacific after an 8.3 mag earthquake off the south cost of Samoa.

More details here.

1.57 metre magnitude wave has been generated at amplitude 4 minutes. This is relative to normal sealevels and is not overall wave size once it reaches shallower waters.

Hope all goes as well as can be expected.

Phil

Nothing happened along NZ shorelines but it is a differnt headline in Samoa... folk there are suffering.

Deaths toll rises after quake, tsunami hit Samoa | Stuff.co.nz

Deaths toll rises after quake, tsunami hit Samoa

'There are bodies everywhere'

The death toll from a massive South Pacific earthquake and tsunami has risen to at least 28, with a minimum of 14 reported dead in both Samoa and American Samoa, the Red Cross and media reports said.

The death toll is expected to rise.
"We are on our way to the south coast where our people have told us of 11 deaths and we heard on the radio of another three," the secretary general of the Red Cross in Samoa, Talutala Mauala told AFP.

"There have also been some injuries. We won't know the full extent of the damage until we get there and see for ourselves."

Radio KSBS-FM reported at least 14 people were killed in the Poloa, Asili, Pago Pago and Leone areas of American Samoa.
A Samoan reporter said tsunami victims "are everywhere" in a hospital near a hard-hit area.
Associated Press reporter Keni Lesa said three or four villages on the popular tourist coast near the southern town of Lalomanu on Samoa's main island of Upolu had been "wiped out" by waves that roared ashore early Wednesday.
Lesa said he had visited the town's main hospital where "there are bodies everywhere", including at least one child.

New Zealand's deputy high commissioner to the Samoan capital Apia, David Dolphin, said he was aware of reports five people were killed in Samoa.
Most of the damage appeared to be centred on the island's southern coast where waves of six-to-eight metres were recorded.
"There are reports of some quite serious damage, at least five fatalities and quite a few reports of people missing," said Dolphin, who was on the north coast at the time.
The earthquake, with a magnitude of 8.3 struck at 6.48am and was followed by tsunamis in Samoa and neighbouring American Samoa.
Some unconfirmed reports have put the death toll at 40.
At least two Kiwis have been taken to hospital in Samoa following the tsunami.

They are believed to be an elderly woman and a pregnant woman who were staying a resort near Lalomanu.

It is believed they were suffering from shock and were not seriously injured.
TRAUMATISED
Lyall Preston and a group of holidaymakers from Dargaville in Northland watched from higher ground as the tsunami hit their Sinalei resort located on Samoa's southern coastline.

The group then witnessed the bodies of three young children wash towards them.

Speaking to Dargaville and Districts News, Collen Preston said her son found three little children dead.
"He is just traumatised".

"My son noticed early this morning that the tide had gone right out so he organised for the group to run to higher ground and they watched as the tsunami hit."

Ms Preston believes the group were not warned that a tsunami was coming.

"Most of the hotel they were staying at was washed away."

VILLAGE FLATTENED
New Zealander Graeme Ansell said the Samoan beach village of Sau Sau Beach Fale was levelled.
"It was very quick. The whole village has been wiped out," Ansell told National Radio from a hill near Samoa’s capital, Apia.
"There’s not a building standing. We’ve all clambered up hills, and one of our party has a broken leg. There will be people in a great lot of need ’round here."
A tsunami swept into Pago Pago, capital of American Samoa, shortly after the earthquake, sending sea water surging inland about 100 metres before receding, leaving some cars stuck in mud.
The staff of the port ran to higher ground, and police soon came by, telling residents to get inland.
In Fagatogo, water reached the waterfront town’s meeting field and covered portions of the main highway, which also was plagued by rock slides.
In Samoa, the powerful quake jolted people awake.
"It was pretty strong; it was long and lasted at least two minutes," one resident told local radio.
"It’s the strongest I have felt, and we ran outside. You could see all the trees and houses were shaking," he said.
Sulili Dusi told New Zealand’s National Radio that "everything dropped on the floor and we thought the house was going to go down as well. Thank God, it didn’t". Along with neighbors, they fled to high ground.
She said the tsunami hit the south side of the island, and some "cars have been taken". She did not elaborate, but added "we just thank God no life has been taken yet".
Another resident, Dean Phillips, said the southern coast of Upolu island had been struck by the tsunami.
"The police are sending everybody up to high ground," he said.
Local media said they had reports of some landslides in the Solosolo region of the main Samoan island of Upolu and damage to plantations in the countryside outside Apia.
There were no immediate reports of injury or serious damage from local emergency services, but people reported cracks in some homes and items tossed from shelves.
In its preliminary earthquake report, the US Geological Survey put the epicentre 204 kilometres south-southwest of Samoa's capital Apia and at a depth of 85 kilometres.
AIR NEW ZEALAND FLIGHTS
Air New Zealand has added an extra 150 seats and extra cargo capacity to its Auckland to Samoa flight this afternoon.

General Manager Airline Operations David Morgan says the service has been up-gauged from a 152 seat A320 to a 304 seat Boeing 777-200ER.

“We are acutely aware that this is an evolving situation and Government and aid agencies may require the ability to move people or supplies at short notice,” he said.

“We have been in touch with the New Zealand Government and offered whatever support we can to emergency relief efforts and to repatriate any Kiwis who want to leave Samoa and get home. While the airport at Samoa is currently closed for inspection, we are hopeful that it will be operational by mid-afternoon.
TSUNAMI HITS SAMOA

A tsunami was observed at Apia, Samoa, and at Pago Pago, American Samoa, according to the West Coast/Alaska Tsunami Warning Centre, a branch of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The waves at Pago Pago were 1.57m above normal sea level, according to the Pacific Western Tsunami Warning Centre in Hawaii.
The centre earlier issued a tsunami warning for New Zealand, American Samoa and other small Pacific islands. It later cancelled the warning.
A spokeswoman for Samoa Police told Stuff.co.nz that villages on the country’s southern coast had been hit by a tsunami.
"We cannot say much more, we’re extremely busy, but, yes, we have been hit," she said.
Polynesia Radio in Apia told Stuff that they were receiving reports from Siumu and Lotofaga that a tsunami had come ashore.
Both are on the south side of Upolu island, exposed to the area where the earthquake hit this morning.

In Fagatogo, water reached the waterfront town's meeting field and covered portions of the main highway, which also was plagued by rock slides.

In Samoa, the powerful quake jolted people awake.

"It was pretty strong; it was long and lasted at least two minutes," one resident told local radio.

"It's the strongest I have felt, and we ran outside. You could see all the trees and houses were shaking," he said.

Sulili Dusi told New Zealand's National Radio that "everything dropped on the floor and we thought the house was going to go down as well. Thank God, it didn't." Along with neighbours, they fled to high ground.

She said the tsunami hit the south side of the island, and some "cars have been taken." She did not elaborate, but added "we just thank God no life has been taken yet."

Another resident, Dean Phillips, said the southern coast of Upolu island had been struck by the tsunami.

"The police are sending everybody up to high ground," he said.
Local media said they had reports of some landslides in the Solosolo region of the main Samoan island of Upolu and damage to plantations in the countryside outside Apia.
In the northern Tongan island of Vavau the earthquake has also been severely felt.
SURVIVOR: SAMOA

Filming of a new season of Survivor: Samoa – the second in a row to be filmed on Samoa’s Upolu Island – was not affected by the tsunami.

A CBS spokesperson said: “Everyone's okay. Survivor crew are okay and filming was not affected.”

Around 400 Survivor crew controversially took over Aggie Grey’s Lagoon to film two back-to-back seasons of the hit reality show
- By MICHAEL FIELD, Stuff.co.nz with NZPA, AP