Roger, J.H.M.; Taylor-Offord, S.; Lamb, O.D.; Wolter, A.; Rapson Nuñez del Prado, C.; Anderson, B.; Fensom, J.; Wang, X. 2025 A framework for designing an automatic warning system for lake tsunami in Aotearoa New Zealand. Lower Hutt, NZ.: Earth Sciences New Zealand. GNS Science report 2025/26. 39 p.; doi: 10.21420/315F-HX02
Abstract
Tsunami are widely known to occur in the oceans, leading to many measures to detect these and mitigate their impact, but they also occur in lakes, and little is known and done to assess the related hazard and mitigate it. Aotearoa New Zealand is a country exposed to tsunami hazards, including in lakes. As the land hosts many lakes surrounded by unstable steep slopes, glaciers calving, close to volcanoes or active faults, tsunami have happened in lakes throughout the past as reported in archives. Due to the increasing development of communities along lakeshores and general attractivity of lakes (tourism, nautical activities, fishing, etc.), the lack of monitoring of tsunami in lakes is a concern and may be a useful part of a risk-reduction strategy. However, unlike ocean tsunami, the available timebetween generation and the moment that the waves reach populated shores is always very small(with a maximum of a few minutes for large lakes like Taupō or Tekapo), which provides very littletime to trigger warnings or alerts and evacuate. In this context, and considering current technologies and overseas procedures, we explore the feasibility to further develop a fully automatic monitoring and warning system for lake tsunami in Aotearoa New Zealand. (auths)
