'Britain needs tsunami warning system'
Last updated at 15:53 04 January 2005
Millions of lives could be lost if a large tidal wave struck, but people were sceptical about the possibility simply because it happens in this part of the world so seldom, said Professor Michael Disney.
He wants to see a warning system and evacuation plans in place, and is now drawing up a report outlining the risks to submit to the Government.
Prof Disney, who is a consultant to Nasa and the European Space Agency and professor of astronomy at Cardiff University, said: "The problem is that people have not had a tidal wave here in recent history so they dismiss the whole idea.
"In 1755 Lisbon in Portugal was wiped out by a tidal wave. At least 30,000 people were killed, but probably 50,000, and, if you allow for population increase, today that would amount to several hundred thousand.
"If you can have tidal waves in Lisbon you can certainly get them in the lower lying parts of western Europe."
Parts of Britain at risk of tidal waves include both sides of the Bristol Channel, parts of Lancashire and most of the east coast.
"They occur infrequently, maybe every few hundred years, but today they could take out literally millions of lives," said Prof Disney.
'Careful planning needed'
He is working on a report which he plans to submit to the Welsh Assembly, Westminster and European leaders calling on them to do more to help residents prepare.
"First of all there should be an Atlantic tsunami warning system," said the professor. "People in low-lying areas need to be informed of an alarm system and there needs to be a proper evacuation plan for their locality so that everybody knows what to do.
"If everybody jumped into their cars and headed for the motorway there would be such a jam that everybody would be drowned. Careful planning would probably save nearly everybody."
Areas at risk need tidal wave shelters, he said, adding that they are easy to build and that existing structures would be suitable.
Overhead car parks were ideal, said Prof Disney, because they are high and have no side walls to give way under pressure from the water.
He also wants to see sea walls strong enough to resist the waves built to protect the infrastructure.
Just because Europe has not been hit by a major tsunami in recent years does not mean that it has escaped tidal waves entirely, said the professor.
Tsunamis caused by earthquakes are not as prevalent here as in the Pacific, he said, but there can also be other causes, including submarine landslides.
"Thanks to mapping of the seabed around the coast of western Europe we can see signs of large landslides all over the sea floor," he said.
A minor tidal wave would hardly be noticed in a
country such as Britain, with its large tidal range.
"For example, the Bristol Channel has the second highest tidal range in the world at about 50ft," he said. "If the tide was out when there was a tsunami, it would never reach the land."
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