Chile quake: California wave heights unlikely to rise by more than 1 foot
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The magnitude 8.2 earthquake in Chile on Tuesday is not expected to change the height of waves along the Southern California coast by more than a foot, and officials don’t expect to issue any tsunami warnings, according to the National Weather Service.
Any change in wave height would occur at least 10 hours from now, according to a map from the National Tsunami Center. A change that small would be unlikely to be detected by those on the beach.
Earlier, Paul Whitmore, director of the U.S. National Tsunami Warning Center, told the Los Angeles Times that a tsunami warning would probably not be issued for California “unless we see something we don’t expect.”
The earthquake has already generated 6-foot-high tsunami waves in Chile, Whitmore said.
“Yes, that could do a lot of damage” in Chile, Whitmore said. “Once a tsunami gets going, a large-sized one, it will continue for hours, if not days.
“The danger will only decrease after the first six hours,” Whitmore said. “They’re long-lasting events.
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