Re: tsunami impact on animals

Seismologist Chris Chapman was vacationing at a hotel about 30 km north of Galle, Sri Lanka, when the tsunami hit. Among his comments:

"We heard two interesting stories about animals. An Englishman living with a Sri Lankan family near Matara fled to high ground when an alarm about the approaching wave was raised (they must have had a warning wave as we did). When he arrived, he was surprised to find the cattle, which roam freely, already there. Despite the utter devastation, no dead animals have been found in Yala National Park."

Apparently the cattle were domesticated--but free.

Chapman's "warning wave" was a precursor: "...The sea slowly rose a few metres to the level of the hotel's swimming pool and a small wave gently rolled through the ... hotel lobby." On seeing this he offhandedly remarked to his wife that there must have been an earthquake in the Indian Ocean. When he soon after noted the appreciable retreat of water from the beach, he had the hotel warn everyone to stay off the beach and head for high ground. No lives were lost at their location, and only minor injuries sustained.

Although there's considerable anecdotal evidence, controlled studies to evaluate whether animals can sense impending earthquakes so far have proved negative. In this case the animals presumably felt the seismic waves from the earthquake, which would have arrived appreciably before the ocean wave. The animals apparently sought high ground in response. There's no known mechanism that would have allowed them to detect the tsunami itself in advance.

Chapman's comments imply he didn't feel the quake himself.

Don

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Randy Isaac<mailto:rmisaac@bellatlantic.net>
  To: asa@calvin.edu<mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
  Sent: Saturday, January 08, 2005 5:06 PM
  Subject: tsunami impact on animals

  Last night on Larry King Live, Deepak Chandra stated that "....no animals perished in the tsunami. The elephants, rabbits, etc. all fled the coast.......". Presumably he was referring only to undomesticated animals. There seems to be a general public perception that animals can sense a pending earthquake although I don't know of any credible scientific studies confirming it. Do any of you know of any reliable evidence of unique animal behavior wrt the tsunami? If so, is there any insight regarding the mechanism?

      Randy
Received on Sun Jan 9 03:05:05 2005