On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 12:23:20 +0100, wrote:

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 12:00:27 +0100, Tim Challenger
wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jan 2005 13:21:24 +0100, wrote:

On Mon, 3 Jan 2005 11:57:00 +0000, June Hughes
wrote:

In message , Cerumen
writes

wrote in message
om...
On Sun, 2 Jan 2005 16:09:33 -0000, "Bob Hobden"
wrote:

The main risk is the big piece of rock which is expected to fall off
an island in the Canaries, generate a tidal wave that will wipe out
the East Coats of the USA and not do a lot of good to the low
countries.

Apparently a tsunami hit the west coast of Ireland in 1775 ? after a
seismic event near the Azores and Canaries causing some considerable
damage..

I believe that was the earthquake and tsunami that wiped out Lisbon.

When did everybody start calling a tidal wave a tsunami and why?

Why not use the Japanese word for earthquake too?

I *think* there's a technical difference. A tsunami is caused by an
undersea earthquake, or seaquake I suppose. Whereas a tidal wave can be
caused by a "landbased" earthquake. A tidal wave can also be caused by
storms or be one of those "megawaves" that swamp ships occasionally.

It's not true the two terms are interchangeable.

Correct. They are different, but in this case they are more-or-less
interchangeable. Not in all cases.

I stick to tidal wave, but then I still say Peking, Madras and Bombay.

--
Tim C.

"Lazarus Cooke" wrote in message
om...


We have a term for it too Tidal Wave.


That's the trouble. It was misleading. A tsunami has nothing at all to
do with tides, and that's why they changed it.


Well, the OED definition of 'tidal wave' is "Geog. an exceptionally large
ocean wave esp. one caused by an underwater earthquake or volcanic
eruption.", so it isn't misleading if one is familiar with the definition. I
believe the literal translation of 'tsunami' is 'harbour wave', and, if so,
that might itself be considered misleading, since tsunami are not limited to
harbours, and not all waves in harbours are tsunami, either.

Perhaps the fact most English speakers are not Japanese speakers and are
hence unlikely to be confused by possible quibbles regarding the literal
meaning of the term is one reason many of us consider 'tsunami' a more apt
term than 'tidal wave'.

Whatever we choose to call them doesn't alter their destructive powers, of
course, but if there is an almost universally understood term for the
phenomenon, I can't see the harm in using it.

On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 12:25:04 +0100, wrote:

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 12:01:22 +0100, Tim Challenger
wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jan 2005 13:21:24 +0100, wrote:

On Mon, 3 Jan 2005 11:57:00 +0000, June Hughes
wrote:

In message , Cerumen
writes

wrote in message
om...
On Sun, 2 Jan 2005 16:09:33 -0000, "Bob Hobden"
wrote:

The main risk is the big piece of rock which is expected to fall off
an island in the Canaries, generate a tidal wave that will wipe out
the East Coats of the USA and not do a lot of good to the low
countries.

Apparently a tsunami hit the west coast of Ireland in 1775 ? after a
seismic event near the Azores and Canaries causing some considerable
damage..

I believe that was the earthquake and tsunami that wiped out Lisbon.

When did everybody start calling a tidal wave a tsunami and why?

Why not use the Japanese word for earthquake too?

If you studied geology you'd have used the word frequently since at least
the mid 1970s.

"Tidal Waves" were covered in the GCE O level geography syllabus back
in the nineteen fifties

Of course, what I meant was that it's not a new word in English, it's been
around for decades at least in technical use, not that it is or has been a
replacement for tidalwave.
--
Tim C.

On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 10:01:05 +0000, Sacha wrote:

On 4/1/05 9:11, in article ,
"Charlie Pridham" wrote:
snip

Lots of people have said that, but it seems unlikely. To create a tsunami
requires a high energy shock wave, a bit of land falling in would, however
large not be moving fast enough for the damage to be transmitted any
distance, although there would certainly be a large wave locally much as
when large icebergs break off.

But isn't the chunk of La Palma predicted to fall into the sea following
volcanic action?

Yes, but the eruption may not need to be vary large, just the right sort
that lets water in behind the slipping section.
--
Tim C.

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 09:11:41 -0000, Charlie Pridham wrote:

Lots of people have said that, but it seems unlikely. To create a tsunami
requires a high energy shock wave, a bit of land falling in would, however
large not be moving fast enough for the damage to be transmitted any
distance, although there would certainly be a large wave locally much as
when large icebergs break off.

Rubbish. The speed of rock falling determines the wavelength of the wave,
this would determine wether it travels more or less straight or would be
diffracted around land masses.
We are talking somewhat bigger bits of rock than icebergs dropping off a
glacier in to the sea.

Issue 2259 of New Scientist magazine, 07 October 2000:
"It's hard to imagine what would happen if half a trillion tonnes of rock
slid into the sea. But Hermann Fritz, a PhD student at the Swiss Federal
Institute of Technology in Zurich, has spent several years modelling how
landslides generate waves when they fall into water. Earlier this year, he
constructed a lab model of the western flank of the Cumbre Vieja in a wave
tank. The model is an elongated wedge-shaped block resting on a 10-degree
slope with the tip of the block lying just under the water. When the block
is released, it slides down the slope generating a wave, which is recorded
by a high-speed camera.

Fritz found that the sliding block generated a long, shallow, fast-moving
wave¡Xthe classic profile of a tsunami. Scaling up 10,000 times, the model
predicts that in real life the crest of the wave generated by the collapse
of the western flank of the Cumbre Vieja would initially be a staggering
650 metres above normal sea level, more than enough to submerge the tallest
building in the world. Fritz admits that there is a big size difference
between his model and the real tsunami, but he has no doubt that the
dimensions of the wave are in the right ballpark."


and


NS 29 August 2001:
"When the La Palma volcano caves in, Ward says it will trigger a series of
around ten waves, spaced about a hundred kilometres apart. As they reach
the shallow water near the North American coast, they will build up to
about 50 metres high, enough to travel several kilometres inland. "There's
a significantly broad danger zone," says Day.

Although the volcano's unstable flank points directly towards North
America, it is not just North Americans who should be worried. Day
originally estimated that the collapse would create a shockwave travelling
in a straight line across the Atlantic, directly towards America's East
Coast. This would happen if the speed of the landslide was faster than the
speed of the waves in deep water.

But the model shows that the landslide will actually move at around 100
metres per second, about two-thirds as fast as the waves in the water. This
means the tsunamis will spread out in an arc.

Shallower water near La Palma would then slow the waves down, forcing them
to curl around towards northern Africa and northern Europe, even behind La
Palma on the Spanish coast."

More at Geophysical Research Letters (vol 28, p 3397)

--
Tim C.

On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 11:19:52 +0100, wrote:

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 10:53:42 +0100, Tim Challenger
wrote:

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 09:09:34 -0000, BAC wrote:

"Douglas" wrote in message
news
Tim Challenger Wrote:
On Mon, 3 Jan 2005 14:40:51 +0000 (UTC), Mike wrote:

And what would you suggest that "they" do? Get a couple of big sticks
and
prop it up? You'd need a lot of string and blu-tac to hold back 500
billion
tons of rock.

Tim C.

Don't be so silly!

What you need is one giant elastic band, placed round the island to
hold it together.
Then you can start to superglue it.



Or you could build a giant sea wall/dam around the island and pump out all
the water so there's no giant splash if/when the chunk falls off :-)

I like that idea. Imagine the size of the beaches they'd get!

You could fill the hole with lava, if you had a large drill.

A new sport, lava-boarding ?
--
Tim C.

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 11:47:10 -0000, BAC wrote:

Perhaps the fact most English speakers are not Japanese speakers and are
hence unlikely to be confused by possible quibbles regarding the literal
meaning of the term is one reason many of us consider 'tsunami' a more apt
term than 'tidal wave'.

I'd have thought that as most English speakers speak English, they might be
more likely to know what the work tidalwave means that tsunami.

--
Tim C.

wrote in message
...
On Mon, 03 Jan 2005 21:35:32 +0000, Martin Brown
wrote:

Chris Hogg wrote:

On Mon, 03 Jan 2005 13:21:24 +0100, wrote:

When did everybody start calling a tidal wave a tsunami and why?

Why not use the Japanese word for earthquake too?

AIUI, the term 'tidal wave' is strictly incorrect, as the wave has
nothing to do with tides, unlike some other waves such as the Severn
Bore. Tsunami is the 'correct' term (even though we all know what a
tidal wave is). It apparently means 'harbour wave', which sounds just
as inappropriate.

That is correct. "Tidal wave" in English gives entirely the wrong
impression. Just before a big tsunami strikes the sea drains away
rapidly from the shoreline for a short while. Anyone living in a tsunami
prone region should know that this means run for high ground.

Tsunami is basically correct.

In Japanese. The English term is "tidal wave".

They are an artefact of the deep water
shockwave running into ever more shallow coastal waters, harbour and
beach. Well out to sea in deep water the effect is much less.

The word used until ten years ago was tidal wave, everybody understood
what that meant.

Google and you will find

"Tsunamis. "Tsunami" is the Japanese word meaning tidal wave. ...
General information,
"Tsunami" is the Japanese word meaning tidal wave. ..."

The two words are interchangeable.


Japanese for earthquake is "jishin". By no means unpronouncable but the
English language version is not misleading and so remains in use.

I can't see any merit in using Japanese terms, when English terms
already exist.

In the US they have used the term tsunami for a long time, possibly because
the place that suffers a lot from them is hawaii and there are a lot of
japanese there? Maybe this is an example of 'americanisation' of the english
language?

--
Tumbleweed

email replies not necessary but to contact use;
tumbleweednews at hotmail dot com

"BAC" wrote in message
...


Let us hope no terrorist group discovers a means of triggering the
landslide

anyone that had a means of triggering such a landslide wouldnt need to cause
one, the means itself would do.
--
Tumbleweed

email replies not necessary but to contact use;
tumbleweednews at hotmail dot com

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 08:58:28 -0000, BAC wrote:

wrote in message
...
On Mon, 3 Jan 2005 20:16:07 +0000 (UTC), "Franz Heymann"
wrote:


"Sacha" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/1/05 11:30, in article , "Cerumen"
wrote:


wrote in message
...
On Sun, 2 Jan 2005 16:09:33 -0000, "Bob Hobden"
wrote:

The main risk is the big piece of rock which is expected to fall
off
an island in the Canaries, generate a tidal wave that will wipe
out
the East Coats of the USA and not do a lot of good to the low
countries.

Apparently a tsunami hit the west coast of Ireland in 1775 ? after
a
seismic event near the Azores and Canaries causing some
considerable
damage..

A recent article I read somewhere said that if the predicted bit of
La Palma
falls off in one slab the resulting tsunami will lead to the
disappearance
of the Isles of Scilly (among other damage!)

As well as New York

We'll miss the Scillies but NY?

Let us hope no terrorist group discovers a means of triggering the landslide
...

I think you'd need a lot of expensive stuff to move 500,000,000,000 tons of
rock in one go. Someone is bound to notice.
--
Tim C.

I think you'd need a lot of expensive stuff to move 500,000,000,000 tons
of
rock in one go. Someone is bound to notice.
--
Tim C.

Can you please confirm that the scales you used to weigh this item have been
checked and please post proof of the date and the certification certificate
here via a link. (No binaries on this newsgroup)

:-))

Tons or Tonnes?

"Tim Challenger" wrote in message
news:1104852697.f850d3a23620113db1874d4bdd98b45f@t eranews...
On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 08:58:28 -0000, BAC wrote:

wrote in message
...
On Mon, 3 Jan 2005 20:16:07 +0000 (UTC), "Franz Heymann"
wrote:


"Sacha" wrote in message
o.uk...
On 3/1/05 11:30, in article , "Cerumen"
wrote:


wrote in message
...
On Sun, 2 Jan 2005 16:09:33 -0000, "Bob Hobden"
wrote:

The main risk is the big piece of rock which is expected to fall
off
an island in the Canaries, generate a tidal wave that will wipe
out
the East Coats of the USA and not do a lot of good to the low
countries.

Apparently a tsunami hit the west coast of Ireland in 1775 ? after
a
seismic event near the Azores and Canaries causing some
considerable
damage..

A recent article I read somewhere said that if the predicted bit of
La Palma
falls off in one slab the resulting tsunami will lead to the
disappearance
of the Isles of Scilly (among other damage!)

As well as New York

We'll miss the Scillies but NY?

Let us hope no terrorist group discovers a means of triggering the
landslide
...

I think you'd need a lot of expensive stuff to move 500,000,000,000 tons
of
rock in one go. Someone is bound to notice.

The stuff that provides the motive power is totally free and ubiquitous,
i.e. gravity :-)

I would recommend that they start making plans for evacuating New
York. They wil have around 10 hours warning. Perhaps theyhave
already made plans, but can't make them public because of the grand
panic which would follow immediately after the announcement.



Isn't that just the latest Hollywood blockbuster??

"Tim Challenger" wrote in message
news:1104840072.98438ddeea2045e62f46ffa1c2f70c96@t eranews...
On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 11:47:10 -0000, BAC wrote:

Perhaps the fact most English speakers are not Japanese speakers and are
hence unlikely to be confused by possible quibbles regarding the literal
meaning of the term is one reason many of us consider 'tsunami' a more
apt
term than 'tidal wave'.

I'd have thought that as most English speakers speak English, they might
be
more likely to know what the work tidalwave means that tsunami.


The point is, a person who doesn't speak Japanese either knows what the term
tsunami means, or does not, so no confusion, whereas an English speaker who
does not know the accepted definition of 'tidal wave' might be tempted to
derive a definition intuitively, hence the possibility of confusion.

Tim Challenger writes
On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 11:47:10 -0000, BAC wrote:

Perhaps the fact most English speakers are not Japanese speakers and are
hence unlikely to be confused by possible quibbles regarding the literal
meaning of the term is one reason many of us consider 'tsunami' a more apt
term than 'tidal wave'.

I'd have thought that as most English speakers speak English, they might be
more likely to know what the work tidalwave means that tsunami.

Well maybe the 100 or so Thai and other nationalities saved by an 11
year old girl shouting 'Tsunami' might disagree with you there. Had she
not have just studied it at school and recognised the sudden drop in the
shoreline water, they might all be dead.

IMHO some of these catastrophes deserve an unusual and unique title
recognised around the world. Words do change their meaning - tidal to me
implies something predictable, and a tidal wave means maybe a severn
bore or a predicted high water being pushed down the North Sea at a slow
rate of knots, not an unexpected two or three metre wall of several
cubic kilometres travelling at several hundred miles an hour.

--
David