July 10, 1958 Southeastern Alaska Tsunami - Khantaak I., Yakutat Bay, AK Narrative
Passage from Lander (1996):
"At Yakutat Bay, Jeanne Walton, president of the Bellingham Canning Company,
Robert Tibbs, a Federal Aviation Administration employee, his wife, and John
Williams, postmaster of Yakutat, and his wife, Dora, had gone to Turner Point on
Khantaak Island about 2 miles northwest of Yakutat in two boats to pick berries.
After 9 P.M. the Williams decided to leave. A few minutes after waving good-by
to the remaining three they noticed the trees were swaying. Looking back to
where the others had been standing they saw a wave approaching. The wave was so
high they could not see the trees on the part of Khantaak that they had just
left, which was now one-half to one mile behind them. Mr. Williams increased
the speed of the boat to its maximum of 25 mph attempting to outrun the wave.
The wave overtook them before they could cover the remaining distance, but by
then it was quite small and harmless.
The wave was observed by a resident on the shore at Yakutat with an estimated
height of 15 to 20 feet initially. It was estimated to have been 3 feet at the
Bellingham Cannery dock, breaking mooring lines there. Two later swells of
nearly equal height also tore loose mooring lines. The three whe had remained
on the island were never found, although search parties reached the area about
20 minutes later. Their badly damaged boat surfaced. A section of the island
tip 150 feet by 1000 feet had slumped into the water, leaving a 3 1/2 foot
scarp. Thw water was 90 feet deep over what had been land. Approximately
500,000 cubuc yards of material had slumped about 100 feet. (This same point of
land had slumped into Yakutat Bay in the 1899 earthquake.) At the "Mill Pond"
about 300 yards northeast of the eastern end of the Yakutat airport runway,
large logs were thrown up on the bank four feet above water level. This is the
second indepndent tsunami generated by this earthquake and was due to a
submarine landslide. There were reports that the island had risen about 20 feet
but this probably was a confusion with the fact that water at this point had
temporarily fallen about this amount due to the landslide."
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