Boyd Morrison - The Tsunami Countdown

“Can you get the main island operator for me?” Kai asked.

She tried without success. Just that fast busy signal again.

“All I’m getting is an out-of-order tone, sir,” she said.

“Is that unusual?”

“The power goes out down there on a regular basis. It always shuts everything down, including communications. Comms also failed once when there was a fire at the switching station on the island, but we haven’t had any problems lately. It’s probably just a power outage. Would you like me to continue trying?”

“Yes, please.” Kai told her who he was and asked her to call him back when she got through. Their inability to get through to anyone was troubling, and Kai couldn’t help feel like there was pattern to all of this that he was missing. Still, he didn’t have the hard data to show that it was anything other than a coincidence.

Reggie didn’t have any more luck contacting someone than Kai did.

“Any signal from the tide gauge?” Kai asked, hopeful that it was just a temporary glitch.

“Not a blip,” Reggie said.

Kai told Reggie the operator’s theory about a power outage.

“That’s a fine idea,” Reggie said, “but the tide gauge has a battery backup.”

Kai had forgotten about that. “It has enough juice for twenty-four hours, right?”

“Up to twenty-four hours at full capacity. Of course, that’s if the battery is charged. Steve has been known to put off tide gauge maintenance in the past. It’s possible the battery is dead. Then a power outage would definitely take the gauge offline.”

“So we were expecting a wave to reach Christmas Island at 9:25 a.m.,” Kai said, summing up the series of coincidences. “The tide gauge was supposed to send a signal at 9:30 a.m. But there was a power outage on the island that started sometime between when we received the last tide gauge reading at 8:30 and when we were supposed to receive the 9:30 signal. And because the battery backup was not charged, the power outage knocked out the comm equipment on the tide gauge.” Despite the skepticism in his voice, the scenario was possible. Kai would have felt better if the 8:30 signal had also failed to come in, but there it was on the log sheet, right on time.

Reggie opened his mouth to speak, then hesitated.

“What?” Kai said.

“Well, I just thought I should bring it up. Do you want me to send out a warning?”

“A warning?” Brad said. “Oh, this’ll be good.”

“Brad, please,” Kai said, putting up his hand to show that he wasn’t in the mood for Brad’s giddy enthusiasm. He needed to concentrate.

Sending out a tsunami warning would be a bold step. The situation didn’t fit any established scenarios. Kai would simply be going on gut.

Issuing a tsunami warning was not a responsibility that he took lightly, particularly because he’d been on the job for less than a year. Doing so would cause a massive disruption to businesses and tourists in Hawaii, not to mention the enormous cost associated with an evacuation.

In 1994 a huge earthquake near the Kurile Islands in Russia measuring a magnitude of 8.1 prompted the PTWC to issue a tsunami warning for the Pacific region. Despite getting tide measurements at Midway and Wake islands that indicated a surge could be expected in Hawaii, they couldn’t predict how big the waves would be. In fact, a tsunami did arrive, but it never rose above three feet. The tsunami warning had cost the state an estimated $30 million.

More recently, the PTWC had issued a warning based on a magnitude 7.6 quake off the coast of Alaska, but when tide data showed that no destructive waves were expected, the warning was called off forty-five minutes later. The financial cost had been minimal, but it didn’t help the public trust the system. Many news programs had repeatedly shown videos of frightened residents evacuating the city, even after the warning had been rescinded. The false alarm was implicated as just another failure of federal disaster readiness, even though they had followed procedure to the letter.

If Kai issued a warning based on just his hunch and it turned out to be another false alarm, not only would he be criticized by everyone from the governor to the NOAA administrator, but the public would get so frustrated by the repeated false alarms that they might start to ignore subsequent warnings. A repeat of the full 1994 warning now would be even more expensive than it had been then, at least $50 million.

“So you think we should issue the warning?” Kai asked Reggie.

“No, not at all. I just wanted to throw it out there. But you’re the one who gets the big bucks to make the call.”

Kai paused. The signal loss was a strange coincidence, yes, and he couldn’t help thinking that there was some small nugget of information that he wasn’t seeing that would offer an explanation for what was happening. But the raw data didn’t justify a tsunami warning. Historically, the earthquake just wasn’t strong enough. Even with a stronger earthquake, a tsunami was unlikely.

“Kai?” Reggie said. “What should we do?”

Kai sighed. Despite his misgivings, he just couldn’t issue a warning. Not yet. Not without knowing more.

“We’re going to wait,” Kai said. “Let’s hope the power comes back on soon and we can get on with our day.”

Reggie nodded and got back on the phone while Kai tried to ignore the nagging little voice in his head that said he was making the wrong decision.

9:42 a.m .

As Teresa now saw, the Memorial Day holiday’s beautiful weather brought out not only the travelers from the mainland but what seemed like every local on the island. Waikiki was packed. By the time they pulled into the Grand Hawaiian’s parking lot, it was nearly full. “But Aunt Rachel let Lani get her ears pierced,” Mia said as they got out of the Jeep. “And my friend Monica got a tattoo on her ankle.”

Teresa popped open the hatch. “If you think I’m going to let you get a navel piercing, you’re dreaming.”

“Mom, please!”

“You’re too young. And don’t even start with the tattoos.” Mia had been bringing up the subject of belly button piercing for over a month.

“What is the difference between getting my belly button pierced and my ears pierced?” Mia’s voice was headed into whine country.

“One is harmless decoration, and the other is an advertisement for sex. You’re not mature enough for it. We can talk about it again when you turn eighteen.”

Mia pulled a boogie board out and slammed it to the ground.

“Be careful with that!” Teresa said. “Are you trying to prove my point?”

“Mom, I’m almost fourteen. I know a lot of girls my age that have them. And it’s not sexual.”

“Sure it isn’t.” Teresa locked the car and headed toward the sunlight beckoning from the garage exit. “Come on.”

Mia reluctantly picked up her board and followed her mother.

“Lani,” Mia said, “don’t you think Mom should let me get my navel pierced?”

“I don’t know,” Lani said. She obviously didn’t want to get involved.

Teresa stopped at the exit. “Mia, while I’m in charge, you are not lifting up your shirt to show some boy your navel ring, which is about the only thing it’s good for. And yes, I realize you are about to be prancing around the beach in a bikini in a few minutes anyway, but that’s the way it is. Got it?”

Mia ground her teeth, but said nothing.

“Good,” Teresa said. “Let’s go find some beach and have fun.”

They emerged from the garage onto Kalakaua Avenue, the main drag up and down Waikiki. To the west, the view was obscured by the hundreds of high-rise hotels and condominiums that extended to the office buildings of downtown Honolulu. In the other direction, Kalakaua stretched past the last hotel on Waikiki about a half mile away, where it passed the zoo and finally ran into Diamond Head, the massive extinct volcano that served as Honolulu’s dominant landmark.