gringorio - 11-20-2004 at 07:57 PM
Have there ever been any recorded tsunamis within the Sea of Cortez? If so, does anyone know where and when?
Thank you!
jim janet - 11-20-2004 at 08:41 PM
The are most certainly recorded in the deltas of all rivers flowing into the sea of Cortez.
Tsunamis...
Cameron - 11-21-2004 at 05:10 AM
I'm not positive on this one, but I always thought that you needed both a large mass to "push" the wave of energy that is called a Tsunami, (like a
tectonic plate moving, or an underwater volcanic event) and enough "fetch" (distance across open water) and water depth for the Tsunami itself to
develop.
I don't think the Sea of Cortez is a spot where you'd ever see a "classic" Tsunami, but a good storm surge (from a hurricane, maybe?) combined with
high tides and winds would keep you plenty busy 
.
Hasta luego... Cameron
Anonymous - 11-21-2004 at 07:11 AM
YES, Tsunamies accur @ the Sea of Cortez when some freaky Nomad-guys have a come-together and there is this huge wall of beer to eliminate.
Anonymous - 11-21-2004 at 09:14 AM
Grover, Either your clock is off or you have learned how to post several hours in the future???!!!!??? 
Anonymous - 11-21-2004 at 09:20 AM
Oops, guess everyone's clock is off. And I can't log-on for some reason. Annie T.
Annie T. - 11-21-2004 at 09:23 AM
OK now everything is straight. Guess it was a momentary glitch in time.
Pompano - 11-21-2004 at 02:36 PM
the biggest (highest) tsunami ever recorded occured in Alaska in a fairly small body of water...fjord-like narrow inlet and high canyons funneled the
water to a tremondous height..hundreds of meters...it is highly unlikely that one could physically occur in the Sea of Cortez. Only some cataclysmic
event...like a meteor..could cause one. Relax with your Pacifico..take it easy...the sky is not falling.
Pompano - 11-21-2004 at 02:43 PM
As to your original question as to whether tsunamis have occurred before in the Sea of Cortez..the lack of evidence of such an occurence says ...NO.
Just normal high storm surges. I can personally attest to this from 1972 to present as my house sits about 5 feet above sea level.
David K - 11-21-2004 at 02:48 PM
How about a large undersea landslide in the Midriff region. San Felipe would be swamped... Is there a 3-D underwater terrain map of the Sea of Cortez
we can see here?
Bruce R Leech - 11-21-2004 at 04:34 PM
David K You are right on with the Landslides and it doesn't take a vary large one .
Also sense the San Andreas fault runs right up the center of the sea of Cortez it is highly likely that one will accrue in the future
JESSE - 11-21-2004 at 06:07 PM
Theres definately a Tsunami potential when huge underwater earthquakes hit the the coast of Sinaloa, Guerrero, Colima, and Michoacan.
Pompano - 11-21-2004 at 06:55 PM
The question was...Has there ever been a recorded tsunami in the Cortez? If so, when and where? The answer is no..there are no recorded tidal waves
in the Cortez. I believe the questioner was after some hard information, but then I am a stranger to this type of discussion and could be wrong, as
Dennis Miller often says. We could conjecture all day long about landslides, earthquakes, meteors, a massive drowning of lawyers, and God's
Will...but it will not change the facts.
Sea Floor Map
David K - 11-21-2004 at 07:17 PM
Well, discussions on forums often spread into various topics, related or not.
I searched some web sites and found this pretty detailed map showing the floor of the gulf (it is big and may take a few minutes to open on dial-ups):
http://walrus.wr.usgs.gov/infobank/gazette/jpg/navigation/fr...
Here's a thumb of the map:
bajalou - 11-21-2004 at 07:48 PM
David,
On the picture in the link, there are a lot of red lines in the southern part of the Sea of Cortez and out in the pacific. They appear to be GPS
"tracks". I was wondering why they would be on something like this?
gringorio - 11-21-2004 at 09:56 PM
those look like survey tracks from a ship. when i was a work study student at NOAA we (the students) saw similar patterns on the multibeam
bathymetric surveys. no wonder they let us ruin our eyes doing all that mindless work-study work in dark windowless rooms. point, click, point,
click...
Check out the interactive map on this site and you can see the various survey tracks. If you make the elevation/bathymetry 'visable' and 'active' you
can see the bathymetry and the ships tracks. This is cool for me, because when I was a work study student they were just developing this program on
their in-house computers to make the maps in the first place.
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/bathymetry/multibeam.html
[Edited on 11-22-2004 by gringorio]
[Edited on 11-22-2004 by gringorio]
bajalou - 11-22-2004 at 10:34 AM
Thats great stuff - can really zoom in and see the tracks etc
Thanks gringorio, I'm a sucker for anything with maps.
Pompano - 11-22-2004 at 12:13 PM
Possibly another good source of configuration lines, fractures, etc on the seabed of the Cortez would be researching the Jason project on tubeworm
colonies living near underwater volcanic vents along the fault lines of the San Andreas on the ocean floor..this occured here a few years back. I
remember attending some seminars given by the scientists at the Serindad and viewing great underwater scenes which were very descriptive of the
fissures. (By Golly, I guess these forums do kind of twist and turn a little, don't they?) Jason Projects/US Navy/Natl. Geographic.
bajalou - 11-22-2004 at 01:04 PM
INEGI publishes maps showing faults, and the type of terrain. (what type of rocks etc. the area is made up of. Don't know if they show any of the
underwater features, nor if they are available on-line.
Anonymous - 11-24-2004 at 03:58 PM
GROVER ,,, I guess you are the only one who knows who posted that Beer- Tsunami.
Yes it is the ol beer-drinking-beer-stinking-german-guy.
back to nomad but under no pseudonym.
I would really like to meet you > and everybody who loves beer like me ( no need for sun-down ) and knows BCS.
Please post here if intested.
I am in La Paz at this time and a short trip towrds west is no big deal.
thanx for answering anyway even if not interested.
Take care my friends and have a good one.
Frank
Germanicus - 11-26-2004 at 10:38 AM
... and I answered in that other thread. But again, I am not disappointed at all.
BCS is like I wqas expecting it.
O.K., I gotto admit that we have a huge Mexican enclave in San Antonio > called "taco-town".
So I knew how mexicans used to live.
But all tha does not mean to me that I will possible make some nasty axperiance as well.
I'm expecting that somehow for not to be too much disappointed.
> thing negativ and you only can be surprised positive.
Well and about the tsunami :
That's the only tsunami a German is afriad about :::: A huge pile of beer and he can not handle it > let's say: beeing helpless to eliminate that pile.
It was more kinda joke.
Take care and let me know when we can meet.
Frank