BANGOR A powerful and incessant tsunami generated by the next Cascadia megaquake would crest Navy piers and wharves, flood critical state highways in Kitsap County and inundate other lowland areas of Puget Sound, according to new modeling released Tuesday by the state s Department of Natural Resources.
In Hood Canal, the 9.0 quake in the Cascadia Subduction Zone off Washington s coast would slosh water back and forth like in a bathtub, topping the Navy s submarine piers and pushing waves as high as 14 feet onto the shore at Belfair.
In Sinclair Inlet, the waves would be smaller, the state says, but would still inundate the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard with about a foot of water and likely push more than 3 1/2 feet of water through Gorst, closing the highway. Other lowland areas of Puget Sound, particularly near the mouths of streams including Clear Creek in Silverdale and within Eagle Harbor on Bainbridge Island, would flood as well.