Tsunami: From Fundamentals to Damage Mitigation

Comprising seven chapters dealing with the various aspects of the topic, "Tsunami: from fundamentals to mitigation" includes ample material, making it useful both as a reference book for experts in the field and as an introductory text, since it covers all the different related topics (from history to health issues), while still being a book on engineering. Moreover, recommendations and suggestions are provided following a deep analysis of case studies.

A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, typically an ocean. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater explosions (including detonations of underwater nuclear devices), landslides, glacier calvings, meteorite impacts and other disturbances above or below water all have the potential to generate a tsunami. These waves are very different from normal sea waves, because their wavelength is far longer. Wave heights of tens of meters can be generated by large events and therefore, although the impact of tsunamis is limited to coastal areas, their destructive power can be enormous and they can affect entire ocean basins; the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was among the deadliest natural disasters in human history with over 230,000 people killed in 14 countries bordering the Indian Ocean.

The first chapter deals with the different types of tsunami and their historical data. Chapter 2 describes an inverse type solution to determine a posteriori the tsunami waveform. One of the main problems with tsunamis is how to assess the flooding they produce, which is described in Chapter 3. Chapter 4 deals with the very important topic of Early Warning Systems. Chapter 5 not only studies the behavior of RC buildings under the 2011 Japanese Tsunami but also puts forward a series of recommendations. One of the most damaging aspects of tsunamis is the damage to infrastructure and building systems, which is discussed in Chapter 6, which also gives guidelines on measures to be taken in the future. Finally, Chapter 7 studies the important problem of health and related issues due to tsunami disasters.