Offshore Forecasting of Alaskan Tsunamis in Hawaii

This paper describes a Research and Development activity to develop tsunami forecasting tools for the Pacific Disaster Center (PDC). The activity included analytical and numerical sensitivity studies of tsunami wave characteristics offshore of Hawaii, for ranges of earthquake source parameters in the Alaska-Aleutian Subduction Zone (AASZ). This region is a major source of destructive tsunamis that strike Hawaii. A set of tsunami numerical simulation scenarios was designed to be the basis for the sensitivity analysis. The simulation results have been stored as an online database with a World-Wide Web interface. A database user can very quickly obtain a model prediction of the tsunami offshore wave heights at chosen locations for a wide variety of AASZ earthquake scenarios. This database provides a comprehensive offshore tsunami forecasting tool for hazard mitigation managers.