About World Tsunami Awareness Day
In December 2015, the UN General Assembly designated November 5th as World Tsunami Awareness Day.
World Tsunami Awareness Day was the brainchild of Japan, which due to its repeated, bitter experience has over the years built up major expertise in areas such as tsunami early warning, public action and building back better after a disaster to reduce future impacts.
The date for the annual celebration was chosen in honour of the Japanese story of “Inamura-no-hi”, meaning the “burning of the rice sheaves”. During an 1854 earthquake a farmer saw the tide receding, a sign of a looming tsunami. He set fire to his entire harvest to warn villagers, who fled to high ground. Afterwards, he built an embankment and planted trees as a buffer against future waves.
- Did you know? In 1958, the greatest tsunami ever recorded happened in the state of Alaska, USA. It was 524 m (1720 feet) tall.
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