Watch for the tsunami
All the sirens blowing and we gotta get going
Where is the tsunami?
Everyone running cause the waves stay comin’
-Frank Delima “Tsunami”
On April 1, 1946, a tsunami generated from an Alaskan earthquake crashed into the east side of Hawai’i (the island). The towns of Hilo and Laupahoehoe were particularly hard hit. Twenty-four of the 120 dead were from Laupāhoehoe, where a school was destroyed by the waves. Most of them were the students themselves.
Hilo and Laupāhoehoe rebuilt with some differences — the area between Kahmehameha Avenue and the shore in Hilo is park and recreational land. No one is allowed to build a business or home there. Laupāhoehoe’s schools sit outside of the tsunami evacuation zone.
After the tsunami of 1946, people questioned why there was no warning. The link between large earthquakes and tsunami were well known, but the 1946 tsunami killed the only people who could have warned anyone — the five lighthouse keepers on Scotch Cap — within ten minutes. Hawaii Volcano Observatory had seismographs, but they operated on a Monday through Friday schedule, and the earthquake hit at 2:06 am HST. By the time anyone got to HVO and looked at the seismographs, the waves had hit about 30 minutes before.
This utter tragedy — disasters are unavoidable, but tragedies can be but weren’t — prompted the creation of the Seismic Sea Wave Warning System, which was renamed to the Tsunami Warning System by the time of its official beginning in 1949. The system works so well, it’s been copied all over the world. Hawai’i’s Pacific Tsunami Warning Center has been constantly running since then out of Ewa Beach on O’ahu. Anyone can go to the PWTC (ptwc.weather.gov) and see the current threats and location of recent earthquakes in the Pacific. Hawai’i’s system no longer monitors for the west coast of the continent, that’s handled by Alaska’s Tsunami Warning Center.
That picture is of the sirens that have been installed on every island in Hawai’i. They function as not only for tsunami warnings, but also as air raid sirens. The sirens are tested on the first Monday of every month at 11:45 am to ensure they’re in working order.
Today, December 1, 2017 at 11:45 am, the sirens wailed out the air raid/nuclear attack warning test for the first time since the depths of the Cold War.
Nuclear attack.
Let that sink in for a moment.
The parents in Hawai’i now have to explain to their children what to do in case of nuclear attack. (Short answer, bend over and kiss your ass goodbye because there’s no fallout shelters.) Every person here has to know what that siren means, and we live with the knowledge that it only takes 13 minutes for an ICBM that is launched from North Korea to reach Hawai’i.
13 minutes.
That’s it. 13 minutes to know that your death is coming.
There’s a lot of anger here towards the US government. With good reason, too. We’re the ‘Oh right it’s a state’ state. To say that we’re an afterthought is kind of an understatement. As a friend said: ‘We’re only a state when someone wants us to be.’ (As in a nice, safe vacation spot.)
The military sure thinks we’re a state given how many military bases are here — Hawai’i is the most militarily occupied state. I use the term occupied intentionally. Hawai’i is occupied territory that was stolen, wrongfully annexed, and illegally given statehood. (I’ll be happy to answer questions about this in the comments, but I won’t write the full thing here.)
Hawai’i is the one standing in the line of fire because of a blowhard conman that has issues with his ego. North Korea’s ICBMs can’t really make it to the West Coast. But they can make it here. Everyone on the continent can sleep soundly, but we can’t. No one on the East Coast of the continent has to worry about nuclear threats. (Well unless Putin gets huffy, and even then, 50/50 chance of the damn thing falling flat in the Atlantic.)
Hawai’i has to deal with the decisions made over 5000 miles away, decisions and words that have now put our lives at risk. Those that make those decisions and say the words can sleep without worry. The rich men say the words of war, it’s the poor men who are forced to fight it.
I’ve made Hawai’i my home. I’ve finally set down roots somewhere and don’t have to be uprooted. Hawai’i Island has taken me in, cared for me, and helped me heal. I care a great deal about Hawai’i. It’s my home. I care for the 'āina that we live on, I care for the ocean that provides, I care for the people who have dealt with tragedy and unfairness and still find a spot to welcome someone who looks like those who caused it. I try my best to learn about the history and culture of a people who were nearly crushed, their sacred places bombed and dozed into oblivion, and culture turned into ‘exotic amusement’ for tourists. I try my best to learn about the local culture — the mix of Hawaiian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Portuguese, and yes, even American culture. I don’t always succeed, but I try.
This is my home, a home that now has to deal with the consequences of decisions made for us and against us. Every now and then, there’s mutters of restoring the Kingdom, or at least let us be our own country again.
This could be our break point.
Why should we have to deal with nuclear bombs while everyone else doesn’t even have to worry?
Why should we have to listen to air raid siren tests, knowing that if those sirens sound for real, we’ve got less than fifteen minutes left before a nuclear bomb hits one of our islands while the people who caused it get to sit safely almost half a world away?
Why should we be stuck in a system that obviously doesn’t care about us?
ETA: Thanks for the rescue and rec!