“Hello. My name is Kai Tanaka, assistant director of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. Who’s this?”
A woman’s chipper voice responded. “This is Gail Wentworth, the duty scientist at NOAA’s Satellite Analysis Branch. Mr. Renfro said it was important. How can I help you?”
“It
“Let me see. GOES-10 takes images every thirty minutes. I’ve got an image from 1830 GMT. There’s also the MTSAT from Japan.”
“No. You don’t understand. I need an image from 1841 GMT or
Wentworth paused to take that in, then slowly said, “Why do you think a meteorite impact is the cause of it?”
“Several reasons I don’t have time to go into,” Kai said. “Do you have any images from the area of the Pacific with these coordinates?” He read Wentworth the longitude and latitude of the earthquake epicenter.
“The next GOES image is from 1900 GMT,” she said, “but even that may not help you. I don’t know if the resolution is great enough to see an impact like that. Besides, there’s a storm in that area of the Pacific. It may obscure an impact.”
Wentworth’s pace was agonizing for Kai.
“We have fifty-three minutes until the wave gets here,” Kai said impatiently. “Less to the Big Island. Are there any other options? What about the space shuttle?”
“Discovery is the only one in orbit. It’s docked with the space station. They’re over Egypt right now. As you know, the region you’re talking about is hundreds of miles from the nearest inhabited island. A higher-resolution polar-orbiting satellite may have been over that region this morning, but it’ll take me a little while to check and get any images we have to you.”
“Please let me know as soon as you have confirmation. Minutes count.”
“I’ll do my best.”
Kai thanked Wentworth and gave her the e-mail address where she could send the images. When Kai hung up, Reggie waved him over to his terminal.
“I’m getting the DART buoy data now.”
Kai bent over Reggie’s terminal, explaining to Brad what they were looking at.
“This graph shows the displacement of the height of the sea level as a function of time. As the line of the graph goes up, the height of the sea level increases.”
“How can the buoy detect a change in sea level with all the regular waves going by?”
“The buoy is just a transmitting device. The scientific instrumentation is actually on the ocean floor, measuring changes in pressure of the water above it. Then it sends those readings by an acoustic modem to the buoy, where it links with a communications satellite. The wind-driven waves aren’t big enough to affect the pressure sensor on the seafloor, so it normally only fluctuates with the tidal pull of the moon.”
Kai pointed to an historical graph that showed the sea level height going up and down on a daily basis. “But if a tsunami passes over it, the entire column of water from the surface all the way down to the bottom is affected by the wave.”
“Will you look at that,” Reggie said, his voice weighted with awe.
The line on the graph had already started to climb. Kai held his breath, hoping it would stay small, nothing more than a blip. But the line inexorably rose higher, propelled by the five-hundred-mile-an-hour wave. In two minutes, the line had topped out at 0.65 meters above sea level.
“I guess we’re sure now,” Reggie said.
“Zero point six five meters?” Brad said. “But that’s great! Less than three feet!” His enthusiasm waned when he saw Reggie’s grim face.
Reggie shook his head. “That’s in the open ocean. In a boat, you wouldn’t even notice the change in sea level.”
Kai leaned back, finally coming to grips with the reality of the situation. “In the deep ocean,” he said, “the wave goes all the way to the seafloor. Once it reaches shallow water, it’ll start to bunch up, slow down, and grow in height. How high it gets on land depends on the run-up factor at that part of the coast. Multiply the run-up factor by the wave height at sea, and you get how high the wave will be on land.”
“The run-up factor for Honolulu is forty,” said Reggie.
Brad did a quick mental calculation. “That’s twenty-five meters. Seventy-five feet. At least it’s smaller than two hundred feet.”
Kai shook his head. “A seventy-five-foot wave is huge. Besides, that’s just the first wave. There might be more—maybe two or three more.”
“The computer models from the lab at Los Alamos expected the first wave from an asteroid impact to be the biggest one,” Reggie said. “But this has never happened before, so who knows? We’ll know if and when we get the next DART reading. In any case, we have confirmation now, even without the NASA photos.”
Kai nodded. “Brad, call Brian Renfro back and conference him in with Harry, George, and Mary.”
After a few seconds, they were all on the line, with one added person Kai hadn’t been expecting.
“Kai,” Brian said, “when you first told me your theory, I took the precaution of asking the governor to make her way to the HSCD bunker. She’s still on her way, so I asked her to conference in from her car.”
The governor didn’t waste time with chitchat.
“Dr. Tanaka,” the governor said, “is this a false alarm?”
“I’m sorry to say it isn’t, Governor,” Kai said. “We don’t have much time. I got you all on the line so I would only have to say this once. We believe an asteroid struck the central Pacific about an hour ago, although we don’t have confirmation from NASA just yet. What we do know is that a major tsunami is headed our way. And when I say
“But you’re sure about the first wave, Dr. Tanaka?” the governor said.
“Yes, Ma’am. No doubt.”
“Okay. Good work catching this in time. Brian tells me that was a gutsy call.”
“Thank you, Ma’am, but we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”
“I know. I’m getting off the phone now so I can mobilize the National Guard. You guys keep doing what you need to do. And let me know if you need anything from me. I’ll be at the HSCD in ten minutes.” With a click, the governor was gone.
“Is everyone else still there?” Kai said.
“I am,” Mary said, her voice quavering. “But George got off the phone to call his mother. She lives near the beach in Hilo.”
Kai looked at Brad, who shook his head. No word from Teresa.
“You should all take a minute to call your families,” Kai said. “Mary, you and George are too far away to do us any good right now, so I don’t want you to try to get back here.”
“Dammit!” Mary said. “Isn’t there anything we can do?”
“Eventually, we’ll have to leave the center and relocate somewhere up island. I’m thinking that Wheeler is the best option, so you can try heading in that direction. I don’t know how long cell phones will work, but keep them handy. Harry, since you’re already at the Maui Police Department, you can help coordinate there. All we can tell people is to get as far inland and as high up as possible.”
“Our houses will be hit by the first wave,” Harry said. Every person on the conference call would be homeless in a little less than an hour.
“I know. And we don’t have any time to get your personal stuff out. I’m sorry.” It was the same story for Kai. Fifteen years of his family’s memories would soon be lost forever.
“What about you guys?” Harry said, the concern in his voice apparent. “Don’t hang around there too long.”
“I will evacuate us in time to get to safety. But until then we have a job to do and very little time to do it.
