Title: Tsunami: Maine's Geologic Hazards: Maine Geological Survey: Maine ACF
Headings: Tsunamis in the Atlantic Ocean
Tsunamis in the Atlantic Ocean
Background
What is a tsunami?
How big can tsunami get?
What was the most devastating recorded tsunami?
Tsunamis in the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea
Large Historic Tsunamis in the Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea (abbreviated list)
Tsunamis in the Gulf of Maine
Tsunami Threat to the East Coast of the United States and New England
Caribbean Islands - Earthquakes and Volcanic Eruptions
North Carolina/Virginia Continental Shelf - Submarine Landslide
Volcanic Eruption and Landslide - La Palma, Canary Islands
Tsunami Monitoring Systems
So should we be worried in Maine?
Selected Bibliography
Originally published on the web as the January 2005 Site of the Month.

Content: Figure 2 shows the generation of a tsunami from an earthquake and how it travels across an ocean. In this situation, an earthquake results from a sudden shift in the subduction zone between continental and oceanic crusts (2a). This abrupt motion displaces the overlying water upwards and downwards, initiating a tsunami. 2b shows the initial tsunami split into a deep ocean (distant) and coastal (local) tsunami, headed in opposite directions. Because the distant tsunami is traveling through deeper water, it is moving much faster. Figure 2c shows amplification of the local tsunami as it passes over the continental slope - this is due to the tsunami encountering shallower water. As it continues towards land, should the trough of the tsunami reach a coastline first, the water level along the coastline appears to fall rapidly, as if the tide is ebbing. This process, called drawdown, is due to the tsunami shoaling, increasing in height, and drawing water seaward. Figure 2. A) An earthquake results from plate shifting at a subduction zone (oceanic plate being subducted under continental plate).