I 

109TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 465 

To provide for the establishment of a tsunami hazard mitigation program 

for all United States insular areas. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

FEBRUARY 1, 2005 

Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 

Committee on Resources 

A BILL 

To provide for the establishment of a tsunami hazard 

mitigation program for all United States insular areas. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. FINDINGS. 

4 Congress makes the following findings: 

5 (1) Tsunamis are very large ocean waves caused 

6 by underwater earthquakes or volcanic eruptions, 

7 which can travel thousands of miles in open water. 

8 (2) Tsunamis are threats to insular areas, espe9 cially in the Pacific because of its earthquake-prone 

10 perimeter. 
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1 (3) Local tsunamis give residents only a few 

2 minutes to seek safety. 

3 (4) Tsunamis originating in one place give resi4 dents of distant localities more time to evacuate po5 tentially-threatened areas, but better data is needed 

6 to accurately predict their potential to inflict damage 

7 in any given area. 

8 (5) False tsunami alerts can result in signifi9 cant costs to several communities, and reduce the se10 riousness with which future alerts will be taken. 

11 (6) The failure to issue tsunami alerts can be 

12 even more costly and can result in avoidable death 

13 and personal injury, as well as destruction of prop14 erty. 

15 (7) Once a tsunami occurs, the technology ex16 ists to analyze seismic changes in the Earth and 

17 changes in ocean water height to determine the di18 rection any given tsunami is traveling and the popu19 lated areas in which it may cause destruction. 

20 (8) The key steps to reducing damage caused 

21 by tsunamis are to assess the hazard, educate the 

22 public to the hazard, monitor the Earth’s seismic ac23 tivity on a real-time basis, and alert local govern24 ments and the public in time for them to take ap25 propriate action. 
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1 SEC. 2. PROGRAM. 

2 (a) ESTABLISHMENT.—The National Oceanic and 

3 Atmospheric Administration shall establish a tsunami haz4 ard mitigation program for all United States insular areas 

5 to perform hazard assessment, monitoring and warning, 

6 and public education functions. Such program shall— 

7 (1) provide warnings of tsunamis, and maintain 

8 the equipment necessary to make such warnings; 

9 (2) conduct periodic tests of the tsunami warn10 ing system to ensure its operational effectiveness; 

11 (3) make tsunami warnings available to the 

12 broadest extent practicable; 

13 (4) establish a long-term plan to determine 

14 areas of possible inundation for all reasonably 

15 threatened insular areas of the United States; 

16 (5) coordinate the preparation of local evacu17 ation plans for susceptible communities; and 

18 (6) coordinate with and maintain membership 

19 in the International Tsunami Information Center. 

20 (b) PRIMARY BENEFICIARIES.—The Program estab21 lished under subsection (a) shall be designed for the ben22 efit of all insular areas of the United States, including 

23 American Samoa, Guam, the United States Virgin Is24 lands, Puerto Rico, and the Commonwealth of the North25 ern Marianas Islands. 

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