Review by Ian Keogh
Younger readers at whom Survival Scout is aimed may not even know a tsunami is a series of waves massive enough to wash over buildings. Thankfully, civic systems are such that areas likely to be affected have some warning if heavily populated, but that isn’t the case in the world’s poorer areas.
Maxwell Eaton III has already provided sensible survival techniques in Lost in the Mountains, and the unfortunate Scout now has to face a tsunami. He opens the book by noting how fast things move, everything covered occurring in twenty minutes, which isn’t enough time to explain fluid dynamics to anyone in an affected area.
As tsunamis are caused by undersea earthquakes or volcanic activity, Eaton devotes around a third of the book to explain them being generated by continent-sized areas beneath the Earth’s surface in constant friction. When experienced in coastal areas they’re a warning of a possible tsunami, and Scout, along with her comical friendly skunk, are staying in a beach cottage on the Pacific coast. Because it’s Scout and we know she always takes precautions, when an earthquake occurs she already has a Go Bag containing necessary items prepared.
There’s considerable background information, but Eaton comes up a little short on practical advice beyond that, as the most useful ability for surviving a tsunami is to run as fast and far as you can. What readers may not consider is that while a tsunami can crash over an entire town devastating it instantly, the water also returns to the sea, and dragging back what’s been destroyed causes equal damage. And then there could be a second wave. The comfort is that most coastal towns in North America have civic evacuation plans. If you’re serious about the possibility, a practice run of the evacuation route is recommended.
As with other Survival Scout books, if a young adult is interested in learning then this is a fascinating mine of well researched and compactly supplied information. However, there’s a lot more functional advice in the next in the series, Lost at Sea.
