![]() ![]() The evacuation structures are intended to meet three criteria: The planned structures will consist of berms, towers, and raised platforms located in city centers and populated areas. The goal of the project is to build artificial high-ground through vertical evacuation structures that coastal residents can reach before a tsunami strikes. This community-based project is a collaborative effort between EMD, FEMA, University of Washington, National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), United States Geological Survey (USGS), Washington Department of Natural Resources, and local and tribal communities. Given the speed with which tsunamis can reach land, Washington’s coastal residents need a faster way of reaching high ground.Īfter witnessing the devastation of other Pacific earthquakes, Washington’s Emergency Management Division (EMD) created Project Safe Haven to increase the resilience of coastal communities to large-scale tsunamis. Traditional over-land evacuation routes to high ground require residents to drive an average of 30+ minutes to safety however, tsunami warnings may leave residents as few as 15 minutes to seek shelter. The death toll from such an event could rival recent earthquake and tsunami combinations around the Pacific, such as the events that killed 15,885 in Japan (2011). Coastal Washington faces the risk of tsunamis from local offshore earthquakes and massive quakes originating from as far away as Alaska, Japan, and Chile. In 2008, a Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) report 1 ranked Washington’s risk of economic loss from a devastating earthquake as 2nd nationally behind California. Figure 1: Ocosta Elementary School in Westport, WA will double as a vertical evacuation structure. The project provides residents and visitors in coastal population centers a means of seeking safety without having to travel considerable distance to natural high ground. To mitigate the risk, Washington is providing technical assistance to cities, counties, and tribes for construction of the Nation’s first vertical evacuation structures capable of withstanding 9.0+ magnitude earthquakes and 30-foot waves. Washington State’s Pacific coast faces the threat of large-scale earthquakes and tsunamis.
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