SENAT
Report n° 117 (2007-2008) by M. Roland COURTEAU, Senator (for the parliament office for the evaluation of scientific and technological choices) - Appendix to the minutes of the 7 December 2007 session
Disponible au format Acrobat (21 Moctets)
II. A MANAGEMENT OF THE TSUNAMI RISK WHICH VARIES DEPENDING ON THE BASINS
While the tsunami warning system for the Pacific Ocean was put in place more than forty years ago, it was not until the Sumatra tsunami of 2004 that the international community finally decided to provide the other basins with a similar system.
A. A RISK TAKEN INTO CONSIDERATION FOR THE PAST SEVERAL DECADES IN THE PACIFIC
As stated earlier, the Pacific Ocean is the region the most often struck by tsunamis. Therefore, it is only logical that this basin benefited from the very first warning system.
1. The existence of an international tsunami-warning system...
a) History
The creation of an international tsunami warning system in the Pacific Ocean is the direct result of the increased frequency of teletsunamis in this zone between 1946 and 1964: over a period of twenty years, no less than 5 teletsunamis crossed the Pacific, claiming several thousand victims and causing considerable damage.
Following the tsunami of 1 April 1946 which originated in the Aleutian Islands and devastated the island of Hilo, the United States decided to create the national Tsunami Warning Center at the site of its geomagnetic observatory in Honolulu.
Following the 4 November 1952 tsunami off the Kamchatka Peninsula, Japan decided to create its own national warning centre, which was entrusted to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). A form of cooperation would eventually emerge between the Japanese and American warning centres, through the exchange of seismic data.
On 22 May 1960, a teletsunami devastated Chile and several Pacific islands. A few months later, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) set up the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), charged with developing global cooperation in oceanic research. Since its creation, the IOC has established as its mission the prevention of ocean-related risks, including tsunamis.
The tsunami of 28 March 1964 which originated off the coast of Alaska accelerated the setting up of a tsunami warning system for the Pacific: as early as 1965, an international coordination group for the tsunami warning system in the Pacific (known as ICG/Pacific) 9 ( * )1 was created.
The IOC accepted the offer of the United States to expand the services of its national tsunami warning centre in Hawaii, which has since been used as the operational warning centre for all Pacific states.
At the same time, the International Tsunami Information Centre (ITIC) was created, whose initial mandate was to mitigate the impact of tsunamis by:
- helping the member states of the ICG/Pacific to develop and improve their tsunami-prevention policies;
- improving the tsunami warning system in the Pacific;
- encouraging tsunami research;
- informing the non-member states of and encouraging them to join the said warning system;
- conducting post-tsunami surveys in order to document and better understand these disasters.
In 1968, the Honolulu observatory officially became the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC).
* 9 Since its creation, the ICG/Pacific group has been responsible for making recommendations with respect to the prevention programmes set up by member states whose coasts are threatened by tsunamis and to coordinate these various programmes. To meet these objectives, the group is invited to meet every two years or so in one of the member states. The ICG/Pacific assesses both the measurements taken and any inadequacies observed, and establishes an action programme to solve the latter. If necessary, working groups are created.