SAN JOSE, Calif. — An undersea volcano that erupted Saturday in the Pacific Ocean near Tonga prompted tsunami advisories and evacuations along the West Coast, where beaches closed and surges of water flooded harbors and low-lying coastal areas.
The National Weather Service said the biggest tsunami threat to the West Coast in more than a decade could produce up to a couple feet of flooding at beaches and harbor areas in San Francisco, Berkeley and Santa Cruz as the waves arrived with the rising morning tide and continue pulsating onshore throughout the day.
“It’s not a one-and-done — this is an all-day type of event,” said Cynthia Palmer, a National Weather Service meteorologist. “We do expect these conditions to last for the better part of the day.”
There were no reports by early afternoon of serious injuries, though two fishermen who were swept into the water at San Gregorio State Beach near Pescadero and swam back to shore were taken to a hospital, where they were in stable condition.
A tsunami advisory is the second-most severe alert, short of a warning to seek higher ground and avoid dangerous flooding. A tsunami advisory urges people to stay out of the water and away from beaches and waterways. Officials from around the region urged residents not to go near beaches, harbors or piers, while in Berkeley the fire department issued an evacuation order to the city’s Marina neighborhood.
In Santa Cruz, where the city harbor suffered more than $20 million in damage from a March 2011 tsunami that followed an earthquake in Japan, waves Saturday flooded the harbor parking lot with about 2-3 feet of water, dislodged a dredge and washed waste bins into the channel. The famed Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk nearby shut down for the day and a surfing competition was on hold at the city’s legendary Steamer Lane.
“The tide was rising incredibly rapidly, we could see the surge coming in,” said Karl Isacson, a Santa Cruz resident who watched the harbor flooding and also witnessed the damage in 2011, which he said was much worse. “This is mild compared to that. If that was an 8, this was a 2.”
Tsunami waves were expected to “arrive in pulses” throughout the day, the National Weather Service said, adding that with lower afternoon tides, the main hazard would be people being pulled out to sea by strong currents as tsunami pulses surge in.
The conditions were triggered by a volcanic eruption at Tongatapu, the largest island in Tonga, which saw its own large tsunami waves early Saturday.
Along the West Coast, the weather service reported the highest waves as of 11:15 a.m. of 4.3 feet at Port San Luis near Avila Beach, and 3.7 feet at both Crescent City, once devastated by a 1964 tsunami, and Arena Cove in Mendocino County. Waves reached 2.9 feet at Point Reyes, 2.4 feet in Monterey, 1.1 feet in San Francisco, 0.9 feet in Alameda and 0.7 feet in Richmond.
Meteorologist Palmer warned that waves later in the day could be even larger and advised people to avoid the beaches.
The weather service’s announcement early Saturday prompted the San Francisco Department of Emergency to order residents to “self-evacuate” or call 911 if they were near the coast. The tsunami advisory was issued for the entire Pacific Coast, from Alaska to Washington, Oregon and California.
“Stay away from San Francisco beaches, harbor and marina docks, and piers until the city issues an official notice that it is safe to return,” the department said in an alert.
The Berkeley Fire Department ordered the mandatory evacuation of residents living at or near the city’s Marina neighborhood due to similar flooding risks. Despite the order, dozens of people remained near the launching docks in the late morning hours, some even planning to get into the water.
“We’re not used to tsunamis around here so I don’t know what to expect,” said Berkeley resident Ben Hoz, a member of the Cal Sailing Club who was tying ropes around a sailboat with his friend, even though the club had officially closed for the day. “There’s nothing I can do if the waves are large … it’s kind of exciting, but if they get higher I’ll get out of here.”
But as Luigi Oldani of Oakland pointed out, tsunamis are unpredictable.
“You don’t want to take that chance,” said Oldani, who packed his children into their van and drove away after learning of the evacuation order.
Palmer said she and other meteorologists are looking to Hawaii and Alaska — which are marginally closer to Tongatapu — in order to gauge peak wavelengths in the Bay Area.
Jason Hoppin, a spokesman for Santa Cruz County said there were still people walking their dogs about 100 feet from the water, and that state parks officials were on their way to the beach with bullhorns to ward them away from the area.
“I don’t think they know what’s going on,” Hoppin said of the beachgoers who remained. “They’re looking down and wondering why the sand is wet.”
The tsunami threat prompted organizers to postpone a surfing contest at Santa Cruz’s legendary Steamer Lane near Lighthouse Point.
Andrea Swayne, the contest director, said the competition for more than 100 surfers was supposed to start at 7:30 a.m. and run Saturday and Sunday.
“We’re on hold basically because of the swell until further notice,” she said. The waves “look great, but out of an abundance of caution, we’re holding off. As soon as we get the go-ahead, we plan to proceed. We’re ready to go, just waiting for the green light.”
Blake Montgomery, a lifeguard for the competition, said he’s never seen surges like these before. “It’s definitely unsafe,” Montgomery said.
Connor Kryger, a 16-year-old surfer who drove six hours to compete, was watching Instagram for updates. His friend’s sister was surfing in another competition down the coast at Pleasure Point and she watched someone get “sucked like a mile down the beach” by the powerful currents. But he wasn’t going to be deterred.
“There’s some really gnarly currents and stuff,” Kryger said. “Hopefully they start the competition up soon. It’s really all I want right now.”
Shane Skelton of Santa Cruz saw two major surges water at 8:10 and 8:45 a.m., with the second pushing water from surf line to edge of Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, which announced by noon it was closing for the day.
“It looked like a king tide,” Skelton said, referring to the extreme high tides often seen in winter. “We saw a couple of people walking on the beach and yelled ‘hey get off,’ because the water was coming up.”
But Skelton wasn’t worried about his own safety as he watched from the cliffs.
“Most of Santa Cruz is up on a cliff so we don’t have too much to worry about, but it is fun to watch,” Skelton said.
Up the coast at Rockaway Beach in Pacifica, about a dozen people gathered to watch four surfers braving the high waves. Minda Yu of Berkeley said she was worried for them.
“They’re out of their mind!” Yu said.
Bay Area weather officials have long warned that tsunamis are a common occurrence in the region, and that bad ones, while rare, could still strike. They have advised that residents who live near the coast stay up to date on alerts and tsunami advisories like the one issued Saturday.
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