If you live on or near a coast, this is for you. NOAA, has launched a handy-dandy service that will inform you via email (to a regular account or mobile device) of tsunami watches/warnings. Pretty cool and potentially, very useful. Of course there are the normal disclaimers involved, but email is as reliable as any other messaging system. I’d love to see NOAA be a bit more specific than East Coast/West Coast in the sign-up process, but hey, it’s a start. Here’s the link to sign-up for notifications.

Update: About 30 minutes ago, this showed up in my mailbox:

      SEAK71 PAAQ 271659
      EQIAKX

      TSUNAMI SEISMIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
      NWS WEST COAST/ALASKA TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER PALMER AK
      759 AM AKST MON NOV 27 2006

      ...THIS IS AN INFORMATION STATEMENT...

      EVALUATION
       AN EARTHQUAKE HAS OCCURRED WITH A MAGNITUDE SUCH THAT A TSUNAMI
       WILL NOT BE GENERATED. THIS WILL BE THE ONLY WCATWC MESSAGE
       ISSUED FOR THIS EVENT.

      PRELIMINARY EARTHQUAKE PARAMETERS
       MAGNITUDE - 5.0
       TIME      - 0756 AKST NOV 27 2006
                   0856  PST NOV 27 2006
                   1656  UTC NOV 27 2006
       LOCATION  - 54.0 NORTH 164.1 WEST
                   100 MILES E OF DUTCH HARBOR ALASKA
                   545 MILES E OF ADAK ALASKA
       DEPTH     - 5 MILES

      THE LOCATION AND MAGNITUDE ARE BASED ON PRELIMINARY INFORMATION.
      FURTHER INFORMATION WILL BE ISSUED BY THE UNITED STATES 
      GEOLOGICAL SURVEY - EARTHQUAKE.USGS.GOV.

Pretty cool to see it in action, though I’m not as concerned about Alaska as say, the central portion of the San Mateo County coast in California….


42 days until OSU plays for the national championship
Ohio State’s 2006 record: 12-0 Next up: ??? 1/8/2007
Tune: Like the 309 by Johnny Cash
Technorati Tags: NOAA | Tsunami | Event Warning | Mike Harding Blog