City warned of tsunami risks

Napier is a tsunami tragedy waiting to happen, says Bluff Hill resident Earl Stevens.

On the day the city tested its tsunami warning sirens, Mr Stevens said he was not scaremongering, he was outlining a frightening scenario that he wanted taken up for discussion and, hopefully, resolution, by local authorities and industry.

The tragedy of the Boxing Day tsunami in Asia, and the tsunami display at Napier's National Aquarium had disturbed him and he began looking into the probable effects.

He had also spoken to Hastings Mayor Lawrence Yule, an engineer, who had seen the effects of the Boxing Day tsunami and who pointed out that the most destructive component of a tsunami was not the water but the massive wall of debris it pushed inland.

In Hawkes Bay, that debris would consist of thousands of tonnes of logs and empty stacked containers at the Port of Napier. The debris would be slammed into nearby oil and fuel tanks.

"There are three million litres of fuel there, and with broken buildings and exposed electrical points ... one spark and the lot would go up," Mr Stevens said.

The danger should be factored into the region's Civil Defence plan, as well as into long-term expansion planning by the Port of Napier.

Mr Stevens was preparing submissions to the Napier City Council, and suggested the tsunami information display be set up in the foyer of the council's building.

He said there were solutions available for the port. Containers should be stored off-site and kept there until the time of loading. Logs, too, could be kept off-site. Except for one ship-load, logs would be taken to the port only when a ship was arriving to load.

Hawkes Bay Regional Council assets manager Mike Adye said the public's best defence was education.

He said it was not a matter of if a tsunami struck, but when.