In The Unlikely Event Of A Tsunami, Long Beach Is Getting Prepared

This week marks the start of Long Beach's Tsunami Preparedness Week — a week spent raising awareness around a natural disaster that many don’t think of when it comes to the dangers facing California.

Dr. Lucy Jones, a research associate at the Seismological Laboratory of Caltech and author of the book, The Big Ones, says the greatest threat to Southern California is the lack of reinforced infrastructure:

“When we have that San Andreas earthquake, and we have the shaking onshore … everybody's much closer to the fault,” she says.

Jones says that, while possible, the likelihood of a major Tsunami hitting California's coast is minimal.

“To have the really big tsunami, you need to move a huge amount of water,” she says. “It would be much harder for us to be hit by it. We do not have the subduction zone off of California.”

Nevertheless, Jones says it's always good to be prepared. For more information, go to Long Beach’s disaster preparedness website.