re is no report that the wall of water observed by Sturgis and Dunning 

 r hit the Valdez Waterfront as a big destroying wave. 



The third big wave hit the town approximately 10 minutes after the 

 thquake ceased, and left l8 inches of water in the Valdez Hotel on 

 anley Street. The origin of this wave is not certain. The earliest 

 lerpretation was that it was one of the waves generated by slides at 

 ' Valdez waterfront that returned as a reflection from the western 

 . of Port Valdez. The travel time for a long wave to propagate to the 

 dez Narrows and return, however, would be 17.8 minutes according to 

 .ation (^9), and so could not support such an explanation. Later in- 

 tigations have emphasized more the idea that the wave was generated 

 a major slide along the steep shore of the west end of Port Valdez 

 afker and Mayo, I965). The travel time would then accord with 

 .ation (l+9ii), namely, 9-8 minutes, and meet the situation shown 

 Figure 165. 



The waves generated at the west end must have been singularly power- 

 . to produce the tremendous runup recorded at different places (Figure 

 ■) (Plafker and Mayo, 1965). It is assimed that there were two sub- 

 ane slides at the mouth of Shoup Bay, one near the abandoned Cliff 

 le and one of the west side of the entrance of Shoup Bay. Shoup Bay 

 :upies a hanging valley whose floor is more than 500 feet above the 

 ,tom of Port Valdez. The Shoup Glacier has left a high deposit of 

 icial debris that blocks the entrance to Shoup Bay. This material 

 presumed to have slumped. The first wave obliterated all sizeable 

 -Idings at the Cliff Mine site, left driftwood 170 feet above lower 

 T water, and splashed silt and sand to elevations of 220 feet. From 

 ; vicinity of Cliff Mine it moved east and probably south with 

 idually diminishing height. 



The wave that was generated on the west side of Shoup Bay apparently 

 ;hed up to an elevation of 125 feet near its inferred source (Plafker 



1 Mayo, 1965). 



These two slide-generated waves caused considerable runup on both 



2 west and south sides of Port Valdez as evident in Figure 177- It 

 believed that the large wave that hit Valdez about 10 minutes after 



5 earthquake (Figure 165) was one of these waves. Probably the major 

 ftion of the wave energy propagated throughout the Valdez Narrows, 

 stroying the navigation light on top of the lighthouse 35 feet above 

 iTer low water (Figure I78). 



The fishing boat^ Falcon, at Potato Point (see Fig\ire 160), near 



3 mouth of the Narrows, was lucky to survive this wave. As recorded by 

 ance (1968), two crew members were on shore when the earthquake started, 

 en they headed for the anchored 30-foot boat in their skiff, a drawdown 



the water suddenly left the skiff beached, while the fishing boat dis- 

 peared out of sight behind a break in the bottom of the Narrows. Within 

 ments turbulent water rose again, and flushed the skiff out of control. 



279 



