Re: 5.2 Gulf of Mexico probably a slump

In article <1204fbgso44umea@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Belba Grubb From Stock
wrote:
Aidan mentioned nephelometers, and with this sort of a threat to the
people living on the Gulf coast as well as to the oil production
facilities out there (Hurricane Ivan caused a mud flow that disrupted
some 25% of the natural gas production, I have heard), one would think
there would be an ongoing effort to put a network of those out there.

They're too slow-acting to be of use for a warning system.

Given a tsunami with a modest (500 km/hour) average velocity, and
it's going to hit the Gulf (of Mexico) coast hard, then it'll have to
have originated on the N coast of Cuba (otherwise Cuba will be the one
that gets hit.). That means 1 to 1.5 hours of warning, maximum. Taking
out a half-hour reaction time ... that's not a lot.

Also, you'd have to analyse the behaviour of a large chunk of the
network to be sure of the reality of a wave. And the meters would have a
slow recovery time - after the seabed goes cloudy it can take weeks or
months for the muck to settle out of the water sufficiently to restore
sensitivity.

Nephelometry is an interesting tool for technical studies (e.g.
the far-field influence of turbidite flows on sedimentation rates, which
is where I first heard of them in the Gulf), but it's not appropriate for
short-response warning systems.

--
Aidan Karley FGS
Aberdeen, Scotland,
Location: 57°10'11" N, 02°08'43" W (sub-tropical Aberdeen), 0.021233

.

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