With everyone so worried about theoretical earthquakes in Hollywood, which may or may not split proposed (or existing, for that matter) buildings in two, there's been little time to ponder how else we might all perish in a natural disaster. Fear not, worrywarts, because a new study from the US Geological Survey has you covered. In the event of a 9.1 earthquake off the coast of Alaska (yes, apparently we all need to worry about Alaska now) tsunami waves of three to ten feet could submerge parts of Long Beach and flooding in the "affluent communities of Newport Bay and Huntington Harbour," says the LA Times. The good news is that the first waves wouldn't hit Northern California for at least four hours after the 'quake, and would take another two hours before they made it as far south as San Diego, which is a good thing when you consider all the people who could conceivably have to evacuate low-lying areas on often narrow access roads. The bad news? "[T]he waters would cause sewage to foul beaches, damage fishing boats in marinas and make more than 8,000 people homeless," plus the promise of a "toxic stew of ship debris and fuel and pesticide-laden runoff from flooded farms [that] could take years to clean up."
· Tsunami study finds Southern California at risk [LAT]
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