Oahu has a series of air sirens all around the island. During the first week of each month all sirens go off for testing. They are really loud!! This morning at about 6 a.m. the sirens went off - for real.
The sirens are pretty easy to recognize.
About 4 a.m. upon turning on the TV (the sleep machine) we insomniacs saw the "breaking news" warning that the Chilean 8.8 earthquake likely produced a tsunami, and it was coming our way. Located here, NOAA's Pacific Tsunami Warning Center initiated notifications at six. All local stations (ABC, NBC, CBS) were talking about the earthquake in Chile, the possible effects here, and what we should do and expect to happen. They sent their reporters and cameras to key places here on Oahu and to the Big Island, since the island of Hawaii would be hit first.
When we were looking for a place to buy, John (bless his soul) made certain that any places we considered were not in a tsunami evacuation zone. (So, we're not, and we're on the 12th floor.) On the other hand Waikiki is such a zone and people were told to move above the 3rd floor and stay off the roads. This was a major change to the prior evacuation plan for the island. Previously folks were to seek higher terrain a few blocks mauka of the beach areas. The last time this resulted in gridlock on the roads. So this "horizontal" evacuation was changed to a "vertical" evacuation - go to higher floors in the hotels and condos.
Well, the 2 or 3 meter water rise did not occur. We watched Hilo harbor on TV as the water oscillated in and out like a river that couldn't make up its mind which way to go. The water level rose slightly over 3 feet. But it came at the calculated, appointed time at 11:05 a.m.
This will be analyzed to death along with everyone's performance and reaction. And out of it I hope one of the items mentioned will be the admirable way that the locals, visitors, and governments reacted. I am really proud of how everything and everyone seemed to work. Virtually everyone (we saw a couple of oddballs out there) cooperated and followed the warnings and directions that were given.
This could have been bad; but it wasn't.
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