GLOBAL INNOVATION FUND (GIF)
RESEARCH NARRATIVE REPORTPROJECT TITLE: International Workshop on M9 Disaster Science
REPORT AUTHORS: Fumio S. Ohuchi (Department of Materials Science and Engineering)
Randall J. LeVeque (Department of Applied Mathematics)
PROJECT ABSTRACT (359 words)
GIF funding was provided to partially support an International Workshop on M9 Disaster Science inMarch, 2019. This workshop brought together researchers from the US (primarily UW), Japan, andChile who study Magnitude 9 earthquakes and related hazards such as tsunamis andlandslides. The workshop was focused on developing new international collaborative projects andconsisted mostly of break-out group discussions around 7 different topics of mutual interest. These
included geoscience and numerical modeling topics as well as risk assessment and urban planning,with many participants engaged in multiple groups. A number of new collaborations weresuccessfully initiated and are still underway, and some journal articles have already been
submitted. Funds remaining after the workshop were used to partially support travel by 6 UW
researchers to Sendai, Japan in November, 2019 (for further collaboration, as well as a workshop,
conference, and field trips to areas affected in 2011). Remaining funds also helped support a visitby Chilean and Japanese researchers in February/March 2020 for further work at UW and a field
trip to the Washington coast to discuss emergency planning and resilience efforts with local
officials. The GIF funds were supplemented by funding or in-kind support from several
departments or other organizations within UW, including the interdisciplinary "M9 Project" NSF
grant, Civil & Environmental Engineering, Applied Mathematics, the Washington Sea Grant, and theeScience Institute. Very substantial support was also provided by Tohoku University and theirInternational Research Institute of Disaster Science (for travel of 12 Japanese researchers in March,2019 and to help support travel by the UW researchers in November, 2019), along with the UWAcademic Open Space alliance with Tohoku University. The 8 Chilean participants also received
major support from the Chilean Research Center for Integrated Disaster Risk Management(CIGIDEN). The workshop included 24 researchers from the US, mostly from UW. This workshop
and related activities have had a major impact in jump starting several international collaborative
efforts between UW researchers and others who have complementary expertise in subduction zone
earthquakes and related hazards, a topic of critical importance to the State of Washington. Links
with additional information, slides from talks, etc. can be found at:
http://depts.washington.edu/ptha/M9-Disaster-Science-Workshop-2019/

IMPACT
The impact of this project included the following three activities supported by the GIF award.
(1). Workshop: March 13-14, 2019
This workshop brought together 44 researchers who study large subduction zone earthquakes andrelated hazards, in particular tsunamis and landslides, from several different viewpoints:
geophysics, numerical modeling, engineering, urban design, resilience and mitigation, social science,and public policy. The logistics and the list of participants including 24 researchers from the US(primarily UW), 12 from Japan (primarily from Tohoku University), and 8 from Chile aresummarized in Appendix-[A].

The following two outcomes also resulted from this workshop:• World Bosai Forum. One significant outcome was that many participants made plans to attend
the World Bosai Forum (WBF) in Sendai, Japan, November 9-12, 2019 as described further
below (http://www.worldbosaiforum.com/2019/english/).
• New Collaborations. Discussions during the M9 workshop between participants from Japan,
Chile, and the US led to the exchange of many ideas and the beginning of several new
collaborations. Many of these efforts have continued beyond the workshop, and in some cases
future in-person visits or student exchanges have already happened or are planned. Some ofthese collaborations are described in Appendix.
(2). Japan trip: November 2019
The World Bosai Forum (WBF) was held in Sendai, Japan, November 9-12, 2019, where a special
session was organized to follow up on collaborations formed during the M9 workshop, see
http://depts.washington.edu/ptha/M9-Disaster-Science-Workshop-2019/WBF2019/
fortheschedule and speaker slides. Bosai is a traditional Japanese term, indicating a holistic approach to
reduce human and economic losses from disasters, which represents activities in all disaster
phases, including prevention, recovery, response and mitigation.
Six researchers from UW participated: faculty members Dan Abramson (Urban Design and
Planning), Loyce Adams (Applied Math), Randy LeVeque (Applied Math), Mike Motley (CEE), alongwith Carrie Garrison-Laney (Washington Sea Grant) and Lan Nguyen (PhD student in Urban Design
and Planning). Much of this travel was funded by Tohoku and Kobe Universities, and funds werealso provided by Washington Sea Grant, and the CEE and Applied Mathematics Departments. The
breakdown is available in the separate Budget Report. Due to the civil unrest in Chile at the time,
only one Chilean workshop participant (Jorge Leon) was able to attend WBF, although another(Patricio Catalan) gave a video presentation.
After the WBF workshop a 2-day field trip of areas affected by the 2011 tsunami was organized by
our Tohoku University colleagues for the M9 group and all 6 UW researchers participated. This field
trip was to gain a better understanding of the tsunami effects and also to see the massive
reconstruction efforts that have gone on since, including many ways in which better protection
against future tsunamis is being incorporated.
While in Sendai, Garrison-Laney, LeVeque, and Adams also participated in the AIWEST 2019
workshop (https://irides.tohoku.ac.jp/eng/event/aiwest-dr2019.html) organized at IRIDEs, whichbrought in many researchers from Indonesia who study earthquakes and tsunamis. This led to thedevelopment of new international collaborations.
Abramson and Nguyen stayed in Japan for a few days longer and participated in another fieldtrip
with Japanese colleagues, visiting the city of Fukushima and some neighboring towns to learn about
the evacuation and rebuilding of that area following the nuclear power plant disaster.
(3). Field trip to Washington coastal communities, March 1-2, 2020
GIF funds were used to partially support a visit by Jorge Leon from Universidad Tecnica Federico
Santa Maria, Chile to UW for several days in late February and early March, to collaborate with
Abramson, Nguyen, and others working on urban design and coastal resilience issues. At the sametime, Naoki Kuriyama was visiting from Kobe University. One activity was a 2-day field trip toseveral communities on the Washington Coast to meet with local emergency management
personnel and other community leaders, and discuss earthquake and tsunami preparedness. This
trip included a tour of the Ocosta Elementary School in Westport (the first tsunami verticalevacuation structure built in the US) and related sites. Scott Cameron, a member of the National
Academy of Sciences Board on Earth Sciences and Resources and coastal resident, also participatedin this field trip.
Notes on March 1-2, 2020 field trip to Ocosta Vertical Evacuation Structure and related sites areshown in Appendix-[B].
FUTURE OF THE PROJECTAs the next steps for our project, following new collaborations were identified. Detail about eachproject is found in Appendix-[C].
1. Exploring Data Assimilation for Tsunami Forecasting with Sparse Networks
2. Planning and risk assessment.
3. Comparative study of earthquake early warning perceptions.
4. Subduction zones and stochastic tsunami sources.
5. Response-surface-based probabilistic tsunami hazard assessment with extensive use ofnumerical simulations.
6. Tsunami test problems and benchmarks.
7. Data sharing.
8. Modeling sediment transport during tsunamis.
9. Studying the effect of coastal forests on tsunamis.

BUDGET
The budget granted from GIF was $12,500. An additional $5000 was committed in matching funds
from other UW sources, providing a total budget of $17,500.
The workshop itself came in under budget with a total expenditure of roughly $9000. This resulted
in part from the fact that we originally budgeted funds to support local expenses of the 8 Chilean
participants during the workshop, but due to some miscommunication those expenses were paid in
advance from Chilean funds and we were not able to reimburse them. As a result, GIF gave us
permission to defer some funds for later support of Chilean researcher(s) to visit UW and continue
collaborations. Due to the recent civil unrest in Chile many participants have not been able to travel,
but in February/March 2020 Jorge Leon visited UW and participated in collaboration and a field trip
as discussed in the main workshop report.
Also contributing to the low workshop expenditures was the fact that CIGIDEN in Chile paid the
airfare for 7 of their workshop participants, more than we originally expected, and Tohoku
University / IRIDeS paid all travel expenses for the 11 participants from Sendai, with one additional
Japanese participant funded by Kobe University.
Nearly all of the $5000 pledged from other UW sources was spent during the workshop, so theremaining funds were entirely in the GIF budget. We were then given permission by GIF to use
additional remaining funds towards supporting travel of six UW researchers to the World Bosai
Forum (WBF) in Sendai Japan that was hosted by Tohoku University in November, 2019(http://www.worldbosaiforum.com/2019/english/). A special session took place during theconference to follow up on collaborations from our workshop, as described in the main workshop
report, and several participants also took part in another earthquake/tsunami workshop AIWEST
2019 just before WBF. All 6 UW researchers also participated in a field trip following WBF to areas
affected by the 2011 tsunami, and some participated in other field trips or activities, as describedfurther below. GIF funds were used in partial support of this travel, and other UW funds were also
used (from the departments of Applied Mathematics and CEE, and from Washington Sea Grant). In
addition, Tokohu University / IRIDeS paid a significant fraction of our expenses in the form of
hotels, some airfares, and the field trip expenses for all UW participants. One UW participant(Abramson) was also supported by Kobe University.
The attached budget pages show the breakdown of expenses and the budgets used. In addition to
GIF, the other UW budgets indicated are:
• AOS:The UW/Tohoku Academic Open Space initiative,• M9:
The NSF-funded “Magnitude 9” project• AMath:The Department of Applied Mathematics• CEE:The Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering• WA Sea Grant: The Washington Sea Grant at UWWorkshop budget, March 2019
Budgets:

GIF: 74-1025

Committed:

AOS:$12,500.00

M9: 62-6697$500.00

AMath: 06-9163$2,000.00

CEE: 64-0250$1,500.00

total$1,000.00$17,500.00

Expenses:
Airfare - Chile (1)Hotel - Chile (1)$1,411.63$1,135.00

Per diem - Chile (8)$0.00Travel - Anne Sheehan$321.24

Travel - Alex Dolcimascolo
Parking - Breanyn MacInnes$443.24$45.00

HUB room$702.00

Dinner Wed (Bay Laurel)
Coffee breaks (3) (Bay Laurel)$1,553.50$522.00

Morning bagels Wed (Einstein)$437.38

Lunch Wed (Med Express)
Drinks Wed (QFC)
Lunch Thurs (Le Fournil)$368.30$368.31$24.10$494.95

Organizer dinner 3/12/19$292.48

Name tags$33.01

Field trip - Atwater
Field trip - Wilcock$251.31$140.48

Field trip van
Field trip ferries$49.60$106.00

Field trip lunch - LeVeque$303.57

Total$3,975.72

Balance$8,524.28

Sendai Trip, Nov 2019
Budgets:$444.05$2,075.50$1,575.50$932.33$9,003.10$8,496.90

Other funding sources
GIF: 74-1025

Applied Math Dept CEE Dept

WA Sea Grant

Tohoku University Kobe University

Expenses:
Dan Abramson

$

-

X

Loyce Adams
no expenses charged to GIF$-

Carrie Garrison-Laneysome local expenses$

425.00Randall LeVequeairfare and some local expenses$

1,714.00 X

Michael Motley$487.50$1,843.00$

4,469.50

X

no expenses charged to GIF
X

X

X

X

X

X

X

some local expenses
Lan NguyenX

airfare and some local expenses
Total

Washington Coast Trip, 2020
Date
Item
Cost
Participants
2/19/20 STA travel fee$33.002/19/20 Jorge Leon Airfare$2,884.35
3/1/20 Jorge Leon hotel 1st 3 nights$606.91
3/1/20 Starbucks coffee box$19.56 Kevin Goodrich, John Shaw, Scott Cameron, Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/1/20 Starbucks beverages$14.66 Kevin Goodrich, John Shaw, Scott Cameron, Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/1/20 Pizza lunch$100.20 Kevin Goodrich, John Shaw, Scott Cameron, Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/1/20 Tokeland Hotel$327.00 Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/1/20 Tokeland Hotel dinner$195.18 Kevin and Terry Goodrich, Scott Cameron, Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/2/20 Westport Winery dinner$134.83 Paula Akerlund, Harry Carthum, Scott Cameron, Jorge Leon, Naoko Kuriyama, Dan Abramson
3/2/20 UCar rental 2 days
$65.94
3/3/20 Jorge Leon hotel final night$220.80
TOTAL$4,602.43

Total Actual Expense: $18,075.03
Total Cost Share$ 5,027.38 (27.8% of total actual expense)
Total GIF Award spent: $13047.65 ($547.65 over-spending)APPENDIX
Appendix-[A]. Workshop: March 13-14, 2019
Logistics. Details of the workshop schedule can be found on the website,
http://depts.washington.edu/ptha/M9-Disaster-Science-Workshop-2019/
Day 1. The first morning consisted of brief overview talks about activities in each of the hazard
research centers, followed by a series of 2-minute lightning talks. Together with another hour oflightning talks in the afternoon, all participants had a chance to introduce themselves and theirinterests. The lightning talk slides can be found on the workshop webpage. The remainder of theafternoon consisted of break-out group discussions about possible collaborations. Participants weresplit into 7 groups based on their interests and 23 extended abstracts that were solicited in advanceabout potential research topics:• Group 1: Observations and early warning• Group 2: Remote sensing• Group 3: Planning and risk assessment• Group 4: Tsunami modeling• Group 5: Landslide/rockslide modeling• Group 6: Subduction zone seismology, tsunami sources, PTHA
• Group 7: Structural engineering
The break-out group participants are listed on the workshop webpage, along with all the abstracts.
Although many participants have interests that span several groups, for these initial discussions wewanted to insure roughly uniform size and that each group have representation from all three
countries. The day ended with reports from each break-out group and general discussion, and abuffet dinner.
Day 2. The second day was devoted entirely to continuing to discuss in small groups and in manycases to initiate specific research projects and make plans for joint work to continue. Below we list
some of these outcomes.
Fieldtrip. On March 15, 2019, immediately following the workshop, there was a field trip to view
some of the geological evidence of past tsunamis on the coast of Washington. Such evidence is very
important in gaining an understanding of past events and future probabilities, and several
participants work on collecting such evidence and/or combining observations with modeling
results. This field trip was led by Brian Atwater (USGS / UW ESS) and Carrie Garrison- Laney(Washington Sea Grant), two local experts on this topic, and had 18 participants. The group also
visited the Port Townsend Marine Science Center to hear about evacuation maps and planning inthis community.
Workshop Participants.
Prof. Dan Abramson, Urban Design & Planning, UW
Dr. Diego Arcas, NOAA Center for Tsunami Research
Prof. Pedro Arduino, Civil & Environmental Engineering, UW
Prof. Paula Aguirre, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
Dr. Brian Atwater, USGS researcher (retired)Prof. Anne Bostrom, Evans School, UW
Prof. Patricio Catalan, Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria, Chile
Prof. Youngjun Choe, Industrial Engineering, UW
Prof. Jorge Crempien, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
Dr. Brendan Crowell, Pacific Northwest Seismic Network
Prof. Juan Carlos de la Llera, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
Mr. Alexander Dolcimascolo, graduate student, Central Washington University
Prof. Alison Duvall, Earth & Space Sciences, UW
Prof. Marc Eberhard, Civil & Environmental Engineering, UW
Mr. Yukio Endo, graduate student, Tohoku University
Dr. Robert Frietag, Institute of Hazards Mitigation Planning & Research, UWProf. Yo Fukushima, Tohoku University
Dr. Carrie Garrison-Laney, Researcher, Washington Sea Grant, UW
Dr. Frank Gonzalez, Affiliate Professor, Earth & Space Sciences, UW
Prof. Gabriel Gonzalez, Universidad Catolica del Norte, Chile
Mr. Juan Gonzalez, graduate student, Universidad Catolica del Norte, Chile
Prof. Dawn Lehman, Civil & Environmental Engineering, UW
Mr. Takuya Inoue, graduate student, Tohoku University
Prof. Shunichi Koshimura, Tohoku University
Prof. Naoko Kuriyama, Kobe University, Japan
Prof. Jorge Leon, Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria, Chile
Prof. Randy LeVeque, emeritus, Applied Mathematics Dept, UW
Prof. Liz Maly, Tohoku University
Prof. Bre MacInnes, Central Washington University
Prof. Erick Mas, Tohoku University
Prof. Monika Moskal, Forestry, UWProf. Mike Motley, Civil & Environmental Engineering, UW
Prof. Shuji Moriguchi, Tohoku University
Dr. Luis Moya, Tohoku University
Ms. Lan Nguywn, graduate student, Urban Design & Planning, UW
Dr. Jerry Paros, Paroscientific Prof. David Schmidt, Earth & Space Sciences, UW
Prof. Anne Sheehan, University of Colorado
Prof. Anawat Suppasri, Tohoku University
Prof. Kenjiro Terada, Tohoku University
Prof. Harold Tobin, Earth & Space Sciences, UW
Dr. Alejandro Urrutia, researcher, CIGIDEN, Chile
Prof. William Wilcock, Oceanography, UWProf. Yuya Yamaguchi, Tohoku University
Appendix-[B]. Notes: March 1-2, 2020 field trip to Ocosta VES and related sites.
(Provided by Scott Cameron)
On March 1-2, 2020 several of us undertook a field trip to the Grays Harbor area, to visit the Ocosta
School Vertical Evacuation Structure (VES) as well as other candidate VES sites associated withschools and communities in the region. The group included:● Dan Abramson of the Urban Design and Planning Dept. faculty at UW, Seattle.
● Naoko Kuriyama of the Architecture Dept. faculty at Kobe University, Japan.
● Jorge Leon of the Architecture Dept. faculty at Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria, Chile.

● Robert Hutchison of the Architecture Dept. faculty at UW, Seattle. Rob attended on Day 1 only.
● Scott Cameron of the NAS Board on Earth Sciences and Resources, and a geologist, Seabrook.
Day 1 (March 1): Westport, Grayland, Tokeland
The group first met in Westport, at the Westport Maritime Museum facility, for a general orientation
to the overall trip.
Our hosts there were two members of the Westport Tsunami Hazard
Committee: John Shaw,Executive Director of the Westport South Beach Historical Society, and KevinGoodrich,City of Westport Public Works Director. Dan reviewed the goals of a cooperative projectthat he, Naoko, and Jorge are undertaking to share lessons learned between Japan, Chile, and the
USA about VES and other tsunami evacuation applications; relocation of housing and public
facilities out of tsunami hazard zones; and other long-term coastal hazards resilience strategies,
especially considering the ways prior experience of tsunamis informs decision-making on suchstrategies. Kevin provided an overview of the tsunami hazard in the Greys Harbor area associatedwith the 2,500-year “L1” event of a Cascadia Subduction Zone (CSZ) megaquake, as documented in2018 Cascadia tsunami modeling of the Washington DNR (summarized and depicted in Washington
Geological Survey Map Series 2018-01, or WGS MS2018-01):1

1 Eungard, D. W.; Forson, Corina; Walsh, T. J.; Gica, Edison; Arcas, Diego, 2018, Tsunami hazard maps ofsouthwest Washington— Model results from a ~2,500-year Cascadia subduction zone earthquake scenario:
Washington Geological Survey Map Series 2018-01, originally published March 2018, 6 sheets, scale 1:48,000,
11 p. text. [http://www.dnr.wa.gov/publications/ger_ms2018-01_tsunami_hazard_southwest_washington. zip]

The group also looked at the current state of ground surface evacuation information published as a
Tsunami Evacuation Walk Times map for Aberdeen, Hoquiam, and Cosmopolis:2

John shared some of the history of the Ocosta School VES facility, and efforts in the nearby Aberdeen
school district to address the most pressing tsunami threat, at Stevens Elementary. We then visitedthe Westport harbor and port, lighthouse, and the nearby beachfront condominiums for orientationon the tsunami hazard and local topography. We briefly visited the Ocosta School VES to examine
the exterior of the project, and its position on the highest ground in the Westport area. It is
protected in part by relict beach ridges on the seaward side. Ocosta School VES is discussed further
below.
We then drove south toward Tokeland, on the north shore of Willapa Bay. We visited the cranberry
fields near Grayland, and drove up one of the tsunami evacuation routes in the bluffs rising abruptly
to the east of Grayland. Similar routes locally provide potential evacuation corridors elsewhere to
the south, before Washaway Beach is reached. But some localities along this stretch that are
distant from these routes would benefit from VES platforms (including some WA State Park lands
along the shore). The latest tsunami modeling forecasts inundation depths generally exceeding 2025 ft. west of SR 105 along this stretch of coastline (WGS MS2018-01).

2 Washington Geological Survey, 2019, Aberdeen, Hoquiam, Cosmopolis Tsunami Evacuation Walk Times:

Washington Department of Natural Resources, Washington Geological Survey, 1 sheet.
[https://fortress.wa.gov/dnr/geologydata/tsunami_walkmaps/ger_tsunami_walkmap_aberdeen_hoquiam_cos
mopolis.zip]A brief stop was made at Washaway Beach, one of the most active sites of coastal erosion in the USA(owing to vigorous long shore transport). I noted between 700 to 1400 ft. of lateral retreat of theshoreline could be observed here since ca. 2008, based on comparing the shoreline indicated by the2008 vintage GPS maps in my car with the current shoreline. The road itself is currently at theshoreline edge for much of this area (and only preserved by active engineering mitigations).
At Tokeland, we visited the site of the proposed (and we heard now funded) Shoalwater Bay VES
platform, about halfway down the peninsula. The latest tsunami modeling forecasts inundation
depths of about 15 ft. at this location (WGS MS2018-01). This structure would be the first “single
purpose” VES platform in the area, and the prototype for a number that have been proposed to only
be used for tsunami evacuation, of ca. 400 people. It would provide shelter for those who would not
be able to reach the high ground near the Casino at the northern, landward end of the peninsula in atimely manner.
We stayed at the Tokeland Hotel and discussed day’s activities over dinner, along with Kevin andhis wife.
Day 2 (March 2): Westport, Aberdeen, Ocean Shores
We visited three school districts on Day 2, and talked with three current and former
superintendents.
We began back at Ocosta School in Westport, where we met again with Kevin and Steve Schmeling,
the Facilities/Services Manager for the district. He led our tour of the multi-purpose Ocosta School
VES. It was constructed in conjunction with replacement and expansion of the district’s only
elementary school. All of the district schools and facilities are located together at a single site at
Ocosta. This site is modeled to be just above the inundation zone in the latest tsunami modeling(WGS MS2018-01). The VES facility includes a two story, multiple purpose area below, and the roof
top evacuation deck on the top (third floor effectively). The lower floors include the schoolcafeteria, kitchen, gym, music center, student area, and restrooms. This is directly connected to themain classroom wing, and is an attractive facility itself. Above is the VES deck. This deck is about
55 ft. above sea level, and can accommodate the 700 plus students and staff of the school district inthe event of a tsunami, who would access it via 4 separate stair towers. Key supplies (water,
rations) for short term used are stored there. The deck could actually accommodate up to 2000
persons in total (about the population of Westport) as needed, but focus is on the students and staff.
They practice evacuation drills twice a year, and can fill the facility in about 8-10 minutes (firstwaves are modeled to arrive at Westport in between 15-20 minutes after an earthquake – WGS
MS2018-01). The incremental cost for adding the VES elements (enhanced foundation and frame ofbuilding, evacuation deck, extra height) was about $2 mln. The entire project (and all of theincremental cost of the VES) was funded by the local community through a bond election, andreceived 70% support from voters (property taxes fund most of the costs for school projects likethis in WA). We chatted briefly with the current Ocosta Superintendent, Heather Sweet. Like Kevinand Steve, she indicated the dual-purpose nature of the facility was popular with the community
and a source of local pride.
We next made an opportunistic stop at Stevens Elementary School in the nearby Aberdeen School
District. Aberdeen is a larger city and has multiple school campuses, located on both sides of theChehalis River. Stevens is located on the south side of the river, in an area underlain by riverdeposits/wetlands and fill from historic development, and hence is vulnerable to liquefaction incase of an earthquake. Differential land settlement and local flooding are evident in the area today.
The school dates from the 1950s, and is the top priority project for replacement within the district.
We met with Principal Arnie Lewis who provided an overview of the history, status and plans. The
school lies within the tsunami inundation zone. Water depths of 8 ft are forecast at this site in thelatest tsunami modeling (WGS MS2018-01). The current evacuation plan calls for the students andstaff to walk nearly a mile south to high ground. But given the age of the students (including preschool children as young as age 3) and the likely disruption of the ground surface by shaking, two
options were considered for a new building. Moving the campus to high ground was the originalplan, and a site identified. But the incremental cost was very high compared to the alternative, andsignificantly much of the local community was opposed to moving the school, which is a key
resource for the neighborhood. In addition, there is a nearby Junior High School of more recent
vintage, which shares the same risks for overland evacuation and would benefit from a VES at
Stevens. So the current plan calls for a new elementary school to be built on city land adjacent tothe current Stevens campus, with a VES deck on top. It would be sized to accommodate nearly 1500
persons (all the students and staff of Stevens and the Junior High). Initial funds for preliminary
engineering work have already been secured from FEMA. It was proposed to the voters in a very
recent bond issue and failed by a single vote. The School Board will resubmit the bond at theearliest opportunity.
In the afternoon we drove to Ocean Shores, which is probably the most vulnerable community inthe area to tsunami threat. The community extends north to south for several miles along a narrow
peninsula. It is low lying, and in the latest tsunami model (2018) none of Ocean Shores would bespared from inundation. The only exit route is the two-lane highway to the north. The peninsula isdissected by a number of natural lakes and man-made canals, which control access and exit toneighborhoods, and are crossed by only a few key bridges. It is likely most of the bridges will becompromised in a major earthquake. For these reasons, emergency planners identify Ocean Shores
peninsula as a candidate area for VES mitigation. At one time the Quinault Lodge and Casino, at thenorth end of the peninsula, considered a building a dual purpose parking garage/VES tower to servethat facility, but that proposal is currently on hold.
The latest tsunami modeling forecasts
inundation depths of 30+ ft. here (WGS MS2018-01). We learned that the city of Ocean Shores has
recently been awarded a $500,000 grant from the state for VES studies.
Our goal was to visit the North Beach School District facilities here, and the superintendent Andy
Kelly (who has been in this role about 1.5 years). This district serves all of the North Beachcommunities, from the city of Ocean Shores to Moclips (and even some of the students from Taholahon the Quinault Reservation), a total of ca. 700 students (similar number as for Ocosta). The
district serves these various communities with three campuses: a high school/junior high and bus
barn just north of the Ocean Shores city limit, a recent vintage elementary school in Ocean Shores,
and an old elementary school (vintage mid 1950s) in Pacific Beach.
Andy and his team have considered how to upgrade their district facilities to address the challengeof earthquakes and tsunamis. His current thinking is to propose a major construction bond issue inearly 2022, after the current bonds are retired in late 2021. It would include a comprehensive
construction plan to mitigate these hazards, at all three campuses.
Pacific Beach Elementary: This is the top priority as this school was just ranked as the second mostvulnerable campus in the state for seismic hazards. It lies within the inundation zone as identified
in WGS mapping in 2000 (updated in 2014). Fortunately, there is an available school site on highground uphill from town, near the fire station (GHCFD #8). The plan is to build a new school out of

the inundation zone that would accommodate both the current Pacific Beach students and thesatellite Montessori school campus at Seabrook. It could be sized to also accommodate elementary
students from Taholah (where the current campus also lies in the inundation zone).
Ocean Shores Elementary: This school is within the city of Ocean Shores and was built in the mid
2000’s. It is separated by a canal from the main evacuation route off the peninsula, with one key
bridge for exit, so VES is the only option here given the inundation depths forecast in the latest
tsunami models. The latest tsunami modeling forecasts inundation depths of 20+ ft. here (WGSMS2018-01). Fortunately, the campus has space for an extension to the south wing of the school,
and it would be possible to add an instructional wing here with a VES deck on top, to accommodate
at least all the students and staff. Growing enrollments at this campus help make the case for the
expansion.
North Beach Junior-Senior High School: Located just north of the city limits of Ocean Shores, thiscampus also houses the bus barn, sports fields, and administrative offices for the district. The latest
tsunami modeling forecasts inundation depths of 30+ ft. here (WGS MS2018-01). The schools arevintage 1990s, and still have useful life. What is missing in the district is any sort of performancecenter/auditorium for district events. The proposal is to construct such a facility, with a VES deckon top, which could serve not only the district needs but also those of the larger Ocean Shores area
community. The existing Convention Center is not ideal for concerts/plays/theatre functions, so it
could be a real multiple-use asset. Depending on the size of the performance hall, the VES deck
could be quite large and accommodate both students and staff, but also nearby persons in thecommunity.
Further discussions are needed to mature these options, and Andy mentioned he has scheduled ameeting with local Ocean Shores city leaders to discuss some of these options. There may be
opportunities to leverage some of the funds already allocated from the state for supporting studies
on these and other options.
We concluded our field trip with a dinner discussion with Harry Carthum and Paula Akerlund tolearn more about how the Ocosta School VES project came to successful implementation. Paula
was the Superintendent at the time and Harry was the School Board President.
Paula noted that shortly before she assumed the role, a bond issue to replace the old Ocosta
Elementary School failed. When she came on the scene, the lessons from the Tohoku tsunami were
fresh in the public mind. She and her team realized the district needed not only a new school but
also a VES facility to provide safety for the students, based on the best available science. They
worked with scientists and emergency managers to make the case on the hazards and mitigation,with architects and engineers on the design options for multi-purpose structure, and with all
members of the Ocosta district community (from Westport to Tokeland) to make the case. The
process from kickoff to the bond issue took about 12 months. She told the community that if themeasure failed the first vote, it would keep returning until the dual needs for the educational andsafety facilities were addressed. In the end, after unsuccessfully seeking external federal and state
support, the voters were told they would pay the incremental $2 mln for the VES enhancements
themselves. The measure passed with 70% support, including support from both the town itself
but significant support from the outlying communities. A key factor of course was the desire tokeep the children safe, especially when the parents were away at home or work.

Harry noted that clear focus on the end in mind – the key objectives, was reiterated throughout andhelped win the day. It was also noted that a survey of the district community helped provide key
input to the process and likely helped buy-in from the community. The Ocosta management team’s
experience provides some key lessons for others considering such a project, especially for school
districts spanning multiple communities.
Harry provided an update on subsequent efforts by the South Beach Tsunami Hazard Committee to
add additional VES structures in the area. So far, only Shoalwater Bay is moving ahead (with asingle purpose tower). An attempt to build a large parking/VES structure for Westport did not
succeed, and cost was one issue. Two other approaches are being considered now.
● It appears that multipurpose structures/towers have more attraction than single purpose
towers. A two-floor design is being considered for the port area of Westport, with a covered
floor for events and an upper VES deck, both of which would be at sufficient height for safe
evacuation.
● Increasing cost pressures are a challenge, and it appears that some estimates for publicly funded
projects are significantly higher than for privately funded projects of comparable
design/materials (costs of labor were cited as one issue for example). There may be options forcommunities to seek private parties to build projects and then buy them back, at considerable
cost and time saving, and perhaps with greater economies of scale.
Appendix-[C]. NEW COLLABORATIONS
1. Exploring Data Assimilation for Tsunami Forecasting with Sparse Networks
This collaboration is primarily between William Wilcock (UW), Anne Sheehan (CU), Diego Arcas(NOAA Center for Tsunami Research), Patricio Catalan (CIGIDEN, Chile).
Current tsunami warning systems rely on predicting tsunamis using models of earthquake source
rupture derived from seismic and GNSS data, and then refining these predictions using observationsof the far-field tsunami obtained with a global network of seafloor pressure buoys. Such validation
comes too late to be useful for tsunami warnings in the near field and even if pressure recordings
were obtained closer to the source, it is challenging to recompute tsunami source models
sufficiently quickly to incorporate the new observations. Data assimilation is an alternative
approach to forecasting tsunamis that utilizes the observations of the tsunami itself as sources thatare then propagated forward in time. Data assimilation has been shown to work well when dense
networks of pressure observations are available and there are studies which show that it canusefully be applied to sparse networks. However, more research is required to understand theminimal density and distribution of observations necessary to provide reliable forecasts.
We plan to investigate the feasibility of data assimilation for tsunami prediction in Cascadia andChile. In Cascadia we will evaluate the performance of the current configuration of seafloorpressure sensors on the Ocean Observatories Initiative Cabled Array, Ocean Networks Canada
NEPTUNE cables observatory and NOAA tsunami warning buoys, using both recordings of small
tsunamis such as the 2018 Alaska tsunami and simulations of M9 Cascadia events. We will
investigate how additional seafloor sensors would be optimally added to enhance and also explore
the feasibility of utilizing ships equipped with real time GPS to enhance observations.
In Chile there are presently no offshore pressure sensors except for several tsunami buoys, so here
will make use of data from a temporary network of ocean bottom seismometers equipped withdifferential pressure sensors deployed in 2012-13 in the source zone of the 2010 M8.8 Chileearthquake. The 9 OBS of the Chile-PEPPER experiment, PI A. Trehu, were deployed on the outeraccretionary wedge that lies along the Chile coast above the rupture zone of the 2010 Maule, Chile
earthquake. This network offshore Chile recorded the tsunami from the magnitude 7.3 August 27,
2012 El Salvador earthquake.
2. Planning and risk assessment.
The application of disaster-scientific models and engineering solutions to community planning andrisk assessment can be advanced through the development of a comparative framework.
The comparative framework developed in this project will afford insights into adaptive planningand anticipatory action regimes across the multiple political-economic, cultural and biophysicalcontexts in Chile, Japan, the US, and potentially New Zealand and the Philippines. The framework
includes characterizing for each context: historical experience, local (non-scientific) disasterknowledge, and the development of “seismic culture,” as well as governance systems at and acrossall scales of social and spatial organization and timeframes. Seismic culture and governance systems
manifest themselves specifically in how planning and action takes place for: (1) pre- and postdisaster relocation and resettlement; (2) disaster preparedness and response; and (3) other related
dimensions of planning and decision-making, including land use, housing and infrastructure
provision, and various social services and environmental management. Important indicators ofsuccessful application of disaster science in planning and risk assessment include: (1) increasingsocial inclusivity in decision-making, (2) reducing wealth and power disparities; and (3) increasing
the regime’s capacity to respond to new, probabilistic, and uncertain disaster and geologic timescale science with (4) creative, robust, and locally- appropriate policies, programs andenvironmental/structural designs. Next steps in collaboration include participation at the World
Bosai Forum in Sendai, November 2019, by at least three of this group’s participants: Dan
Abramson, Liz Maly and Naoko Kuriyama, where an initial framework for international comparison
will be presented in the UW/TU session event. Abramson and Ann Bostrom are also pursuingaspects of the group’s topic in applications for future funding from WA Sea Grant, NSF Coastlines
and People (CoPe), and other sources, and Lan Nguyen is preparing her general exam anddissertation proposal on topics especially related to (1) and (2) above.
3. Comparative study of earthquake early warning perceptions.
Workshop participants from Tohoku University and the University of Washington also developed
further their plans to complete a comparative study of earthquake early warning perceptions, basedon survey research representative of the populations in their respective communities. Survey data
have been collected in both regions and initial analyses have been conducted for the data withineach region. Once data-sharing issues have been resolved comparative analyses will be conducted(this summer), facilitated by Liz Maly and Ann Bostrom, for a joint publication. Given thatearthquake early warning has long been available in Japan, is only now rolling out on the U.S. West
Coast, and is not yet publicly available in the Pacific Northwest, this project should provide useful
insights for planners and policy makers, in addition to advancing risk communication and warning
research.
4. Subduction zones and stochastic tsunami sources.
The first goal of this international Chile/Japan/USA project is the development of a methodology tocreate suites of stochastically generated seismic events for the Central Chile, Cascadia and the
Nankai trough subduction zones. The ranges of the earthquake magnitudes should vary between
Mw 8.5 and 9.0. This goal requires basic research to improve our understanding of subduction zone
physics so that scientifically defensible ranges of seismic model parameters can be specified thatare specific to each subduction zone region. Such geophysically constrained suites of stochastic

seismic events are the heart of probabilistic seismic and tsunami hazard assessment studies (PSHA
and PTHA, respectively). Valuable discussions involving many workshop participants has helped tomove forward related work on generating stochastic subduction zone earthquakes being pursued
by Jorge Crempien and Alejandro Urrutia in Chile, and by Frank Gonzalez and Randy LeVeque at
UW, along with Diego Melgar at the University of Oregon, who was not able to attend the workshop
but has engaged in on-going email discussions. Collaboration is also planned on the use of the
GeoClaw software to model tsunamis arising from large suites of stochastic sources.
Motivation for this research includes the concern that single deterministic tsunami hazard
assessment studies convey information to community members and decision-makers that is notadequate to deal with issues that can be truly existential in nature and involve remedies that can be
extremely costly and/or can create serious social disruption. The second goal of this project istherefore the use of these stochastically generated earthquake rupture databases to conduct
regional- and site-specific PSHA and PTHA studies that can provide quantitative measures of
uncertainty to practicing engineers and communities at risk as an aid in decision- making andplanning. Finally, the third goal involves the engagement of social scientists with communities todesign and conduct educational meetings, workshops, surveys and other efforts to determine theeffect of probabilistic study results on such issues as individual perception and understanding of therisk, and individual and community planning and preparedness.
Following the workshop, collaboration that was initiated between the CIGDEN research group andDiego Melgar resulted in the publication "A hybrid deterministic and stochastic approach fortsunami hazard assessment in Iquique, Chile" (https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11069019-03809-8). They are also working on another related paper on tsunamigenic stochastic
scenarios and PTHA techniques in the south- central Chile seismic gap.
5. Response-surface-based probabilistic tsunami hazard assessment with extensive use ofnumerical simulations.
This project, joint between Prof. Youngjun Choe at UW and several participants from Tohoku, iscurrently being written up as a paper by T. Kotani, S. Takase, S. Moriguchi, K. Terada, Fukutani, Y.
Otake, K. Nojima, M. Sakuraba, and Y. Choe
Abstract: A method of response-surface-based probabilistic tsunami hazard analysis (PTHA) is
proposed on the premise of extensive use of highly developed numerical simulations. The basic idea
is based on a reliability-based design scheme developed in the research field of geomechanics. The
key advantage of the method is its use of a response surface (RS) of a target event, which is obtained
from the results of tsunami simulations. Furthermore, the uncertainties of the RS parameters arequantified. These processes are preparatory to performing a Monte Carlo simulation (MCS). We
apply the proposed method to the tsunami that was induced by the 2011 Great East Japan
earthquake as an application example. The coastal tsunami heights are evaluated, and theuncertainties in the fault slip and rake as well as the modeling error associated with the numericalanalysis are taken into account. Sendai, Ishinomaki, and Kamaishi are selected as target points, andthe RS at each point is obtained from the numerical simulation results. Finally, probability density
functions of tsunami height are obtained by performing an MCS. In addition, the contribution ratiosof the uncertainties are quantified, and the effects of the uncertainties are discussed.
6. Tsunami test problems and benchmarks.
The US Tsunami Hazard Mitigation Program (NTHMP) has held several workshops in which several
international tsunami modeling groups have come together to compare simulation results on acommon set of problems. Many of the core benchmark problems were developed before the large

tsunami events of the past decade that have provided a wealth of new observations to compare
against. Participants agreed that it would be valuable to develop new benchmark problems,
although it was also recognized that it is challenging and time consuming to do this properly, withsuitable input data and metrics of success that make it possible to compare diverse models.
Discussion at the workshop let to extensive emails discussions afterward that have been broadened
to include several other tsunami modelers involved in NTHMP and/or the Global Tsunami Model(http://edanya.uma.es/gtm/), an international network that aims to assess and provide
community-based standards, good practices and guidelines for Probabilistic Tsunami Hazard and
Risk Analysis. Patricio Catalan has volunteered to help coordinate new efforts in this direction. In
May, 2019, Shunichi Koshimura from Tohoku visited Catalan’s group in Chile and began working on
a new benchmark problem based on field data from the 2011 tsunami inundation on the Sendai
plane. This would be a valuable test problem since the extensive inundation over several hours washeavily documented. In the past it has been difficult to obtain open source high-resolution
topography data in this region, but Koshimura is now working on making this available. This also
ties in with data archiving and sharing issues that are discussed next.
7. Data sharing.
Several breakout groups discussed the possibility for improving efforts to archive and share data
related to natural disasters, to make this data more broadly accessible internationally. Examples
include engineering data from seismic structural tests or tsunami wave tank experiments,
simulation results from tsunami or earthquake benchmark problems, observation data from avariety of seismic or tsunami sensors, and data collected in post-tsunami surveys or in fieldwork
performed in the search for tsunami deposits or other evidence of past earthquakes. A number of
databases already exist, and valuable information was exchanged at the workshop regarding efforts
already underway. Participants are now pursuing some ideas that came out of the workshop, withthe goal of enhancing these efforts.
For example, the Japanese database (http://tsunami-portal.bosai.go.jp/en/index) contains a wealthof information and is actively being developed as a national repository. Many of the webpages are
currently in Japanese, and interest from Chile and the US may help spur development of English
versions. DesignSafe-CI is the web-based research platform of the NHERI Network that provides
the computational tools needed to manage, analyze, and understand critical data for natural hazards
research (https://www.designsafe-ci.org/). Use of DesignSafe was demonstrated at the workshop
to encourage international participation. Shortly after the workshop, Ellen Rathje, lead PI of
DesignSafe, visited UW, and several workshop participants met with her to further discussarchiving additional datasets. Since the workshop Prof. Terada and Mr. Yamaguchi at Tohoku
University have also been exploring the DesignSafe database for sharing benchmarking data related
to fluid-structure interaction problems. The National Centers for Environmental
Information(https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/) develop and archive many datasets related to natural
hazards, e.g. topography/bathymetry, tide gauge and DART buoy records used in tsunami modeling.
Shortly after the workshop discussions were initiated with NCEI personnel about the possibility ofarchiving additional data related to benchmark problems or field work, with a positive response.
8. Modeling sediment transport during tsunamis.
A new collaboration between Anawat Suppasri and Carrie Garrison-Laney was developed based onconversations during the workshop and post-workshop field trip. Anawat’s presentation ontsunami sediment transport modeling, followed by the field trip to examine tsunami deposits at
Discovery Bay, led by Carrie, inspired a collaborative project to model potential tsunami sources
based on the tsunami deposit characteristics. Although there are many described tsunami deposits

along the U.S. west coast, and a small number of sediment transport studies that have modeled
tsunami sediment transport by Cascadia tsunamis, there are no sediment transport studies thathave used the deposits to test for different tsunami sources. Discovery Bay is an ideal setting to test
various tsunami sources because it has a greater number of tsunami deposits than known Cascadia
earthquakes. The other deposits may represent tsunamis from previously unidentified northern
segment Cascadia events, or tsunamis from Alaska, or tsunamis from unidentified local sources,
which may include crustal faults or submarine landslides. A tsunami sediment transport model
developed by Tohoku University (TU) will be applied to deposits at Discovery Bay to identify
potential tsunami sources. At present (June 2019), detailed bathymetry and topography data from
Alaska to Discovery Bay has been prepared and is undergoing final review before pre-run of thesediment model by TU. Further analysis of characteristics of a tsunami deposit suspected to be fromthe 1964 Alaska Good Friday earthquake tsunami will be done by UW and this data will be used as
input for TU's sediment transport model for an Alaska source. Results of this study will help identify
the range of sources that may cause tsunamis in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and will improve tsunami
hazard assessments for the area. Additional discussions took place at Tohoku University inNovember, 2019.
9. Studying the effect of coastal forests on tsunamis.
LeVeque worked with Tohoku participants Terada and Moriguchi to assist in the completion of apaper titled “Multiscale Evaluation Method of the Drag Effect on Shallow Water Flow throughCoastal Forests based on 3D Numerical Simulations”. The lead author on the paper is Reika Nomura,a PhD student at Tohoku who was not able to attend the workshop but who previously visited UW
for several weeks to work with LeVeque and others, funded by Tohoku University. This paper has
been submitted to the Coastal Engineering Journal.
PROJECT PHOTOS

Some photos from the M9 Disaster Science Workshop
and field trip in March, 2019(1) Photographs from the workshop and fieldtrip in March, 2019.

(2) Photographs from the Japan trip
See the Google Earth project https://tinyurl.com/TohokuFieldtrip