Last weekend as the east coast braced itself for one of the biggest tropical storms to ever hit the U.S., a 7.7 magnitude earthquake hit the Queen Charlotte Islands off the coast of Canada. The earthquake was followed by a 5.8 magnitude aftershock causing a Tsunami warning for southeast Alaska. Of course, being a Coast Guard family, Kolt received phone calls & the neighbors were outside trying to get more details from each other. Living on an island is new to us so of course we hear "Tsunami Warning" & we started throwing stuff in the truck. The alarms didn't sound, but from what we were told we had about an hour until the Tsunami would hit. So, we loaded up the family & headed to high ground. The warning ended up being downgraded to an advisory for Alaska & we returned home. The effects this ended up having on Alaska? A four inch wave in Craig which is southeast of Sitka. This Tsunami was originally not supposed to have any effect on Hawaii, but sea readings later changed & Hawaii was then issued a Tsunami warning as well. Hawaii's warning was also downgraded later that night. This was extremely scary for me & since I have not the slightest clue as how to handle this, I started throwing stuff in bags as I walked around shaking not being able to think about anything. Situations like this have all of a sudden become a lot more nerve racking now that I have a little baby to protect. Even though I don't foresee us having to deal with Tsunami warnings a whole lot for the next year and a half that we have left here, I have decided to type up a "Tsunami Evacutation List". This will help guide us as we pack & load the truck if we ever have to do this again, or at least give me a peace of mind about it.
Oh, & just in case you were wondering, the rest of Sitka was not rushing around like a bunch of nervous wrecks getting gas & trying to find the Tsunami evacuation site. Only us & about five other Coast Guard families. Oy!
