Hurricane Noelani”

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Disaster Movies: Catastrophically Bad Science

Scott Stransky

Agenda

• Analysis of disaster movies from a scientific point of view • We’ll cover a wide range of topics, including: – Storm surge – Severe thunderstorms – Hurricanes – Geology of the Earth’s interior – Lava – Severe thunderstorms – Pandemics – Asteroid impacts – Tsunamis – Polar reversals

The Film The Day After Tomorrow Portrays 300-foot “Storm Surge” in New York City

Storm Surge Is Caused by Low Pressure and High Wind

• The main drivers of storm surge are: – Wind pushing the water up towards the coast (which is why the front right quadrant of a hurricane is the worst) – Low pressure of the storm suctioning the water upwards

A 300-Foot Storm Surge Is Unrealistic

• It would require approximately 1,200 mile per hour winds—twice the speed of sound • Yet when the surge is approaching land, there is very little wind evident • Of course, realistic storm surge is an important driver of risk, especially from hurricanes, and AIR is in the process of updating its storm surge model

Tornadoes in Los Angeles Make Good Entertainment… and Are Actually Plausible

• In the film, at least 4 tornados form in LA simultaneously, and since it is a movie, they are drawn to landmarks such as the Hollywood sign

• Tornadoes (and other severe thunderstorm events) touched down in Orange County, CA, in early 2010, causing $87 million of property damage in the state (such events are in our 10K severe thunderstorm model)

The Day After Tomorrow Featured Unrealistically Large Cyclones Over Land, Which Is Implausible

• In the movie, continent- sized cyclones are over land • The cyclones in the movie were several times larger than Super Typhoon Tip Screenshot from The Day After Tomorrow (1979), the largest recorded cyclone • Tip reached its enormous size over water, where it could draw energy, while the storms in the movie were over land

Multiple Simultaneous Cyclones, as Shown in The Day After Tomorrow, Have Happened

• In addition to portraying large cyclones over land, it also portrays multiple cyclones at once

Screenshot from The Day After Tomorrow • However, the image to the right shows a set of 5 cyclones at once, so having numerous cyclones is not out of the question

Actual satellite image from 9/15/2004

Hurricanes Always Rotate Counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere… Except in Movies

Actual satellite image of Hurricane Dean

Hawaii’s Hurricane Iniki Was the Basis of The Day After Tomorrow’s “Hurricane Noelani”

• The hurricane footage used to represent “Hurricane Noelani” in The Day After Tomorrow was actually taken during Hurricane Iniki in 1992 • Iniki was Hawaii’s costliest hurricane, causing more than an estimated $3 billion of insured loss (trended to today’s dollars) • AIR will be releasing an update to its Hawaii Tropical Cyclone Model later this year

Jurassic Park Also Used Footage from Hurricane Iniki

• Steven Spielberg was caught in Hurricane Iniki on Kauai on what was to have been the last day of filming "Jurassic Park“ • The 130 cast and crew members, including the stars of the film, waited out the storm in a hotel; "This was a real zinger," Spielberg told NBC News of the storm • Iniki footage made the final film

The Perfect Storm Made Use of Real Hurricane Footage from 1999’s Hurricane Floyd

• The perfect storm of 1991 was a nor’easter that absorbed a hurricane (Sounds familiar? So was Hurricane Sandy) • Hurricane Floyd was impacting the eastern seaboard during filming, leading the producer to comment, “Of course, we were aware of the irony of a huge hurricane wreaking havoc on a movie about a huge hurricane.” • However, the waves caused by Floyd were filmed, leading the producer to say, “Hurricane Floyd went from being our greatest fear to becoming one of our greatest assets. You can't buy those kinds of special effects.”

The Core Has a Great Cast but Bad Geology

• This film features a team that must go to the center of the Earth to restart the core using nuclear bombs • For the journey, they use a ship that is made from something called Unobtainium and is powered by lasers • (By the way, I’d recommend the Wikipedia article on Unobtainium—it’s fascinating!)

The Earth’s Core Is Enormous

• The molten core is about the size of Mars

• It spins at about 500+ miles per hour

• In the film, the core has stopped, causing a breakdown of the Earth’s magnetic field and property destruction from solar radiation

Thus, the Energy Required to Stop the Core’s Rotation Is Also Enormous

• Calculated by one source as 1028 joules • Put into perspective: – 5,000,000,000,000 one megaton bombs – 500,000,000 times the energy of all the bombs on earth – 250,000 times stronger than Tohoku • This is enough energy to power a standard 100 watt bulb for over 230 million times the scientifically accepted age of the universe (13.75 billion years) • This is enough energy to power AIR’s Boston office for over 100,000 times the age of the universe • … Yet the movie has the core stopping without this energy being dissipated • … and the movie believes that you could restart it using several nuclear bombs

Armageddon Also Miscalculates Energy

• Bruce Willis and team must fly to an asteroid and blow it up before it hits Earth • British scientists published a paper in the “Journal of Physics Special Topics,” calculating that this would take 8 x 1026 joules to accomplish (similar to restarting the core), or millions of times more than all the bombs on Earth combined • The splitting of the asteroid would have had to be detected and blown up over 8 billion miles from Earth

The Core Explains that the Core Stopped Rotating Because of a Human-Created Weapon

• A weapon was created that “propagates earthquakes through the core” • This apparently stopped the core’s rotation • Luckily, we don’t have to account for this scenario in our earthquake models, given the energy constraints shown in the previous slide

The Interior of the Earth Is Not Like the Surface… Unless You Are a Filmmaker

• Along the ship’s journey toward the core, they encounter a large “geode”— a void in the mantle

• Pressure inside this geode would be 10,000+ times higher than at the surface, and stepping out of the ship would instantly crush a person

• Gravity is reduced as you get closer to the core… in real life

On the Other Hand, a “Simple” Kid’s Cartoon, Bugs Bunny, Almost Got It Right

• The episode of Tiny Toons called, “Journey to the Center of Acme Acres,” features the characters going to the center of the Earth • In this case, they correctly experience “zero gravity” at the core (but no impacts caused by pressure or temperature)

Let’s Talk About Lava

Lava Is Denser than Films Would Have You Believe

• In The Core, a character falls into molten lava • Someone who fell into the molten rock would not sink • Lava has a density about 3 times higher than water • Similar to how styrofoam floats on water

Video Games Also Give People the Wrong Impression of Lava

• The Mario video game series has featured lava in numerous levels

• Mario always sinks and loses a life when he falls into lava

• Since many children gain their first experience of lava through these games, they can be scarred for life

Peter Jackson Also Ignored Density in The Lord of the Rings

• Gollum falls into the molten lava of Mount Doom, and he sinks

• Caveat: the density of Gollum is perhaps not well understood

• Interestingly, the gold ring, which has a much higher density than water, does float

Twister Shows Many Severely Unscientific Thunderstorms

• In Twister, storm chasers attempt to get scientific instruments inside a tornado • According to the MPAA, which is the rating agency for movies in the U.S., Twister is rated PG-13 “for intense depiction of very bad weather”

The MPAA Has Recently Determined Ratings for Some of AIR’s Models

Model Rating MPAA Reasoning Reasoning U.S. Hurricane PG For scenes of television meteorologists getting pelted by rain and wind Japan Earthquake PG-13 For graphic depictions of radioactive milk U.S. Winter Storm G For kids playing in the snow Pandemic Flu Has not yet The MPAA is waiting on footage from AIR’s been rated first pandemic damage survey U.S. Wildfire R For some very hot scenes

Tornadic Winds Blow Inward, Not Outward as Depicted in the Film

In Twister, debris was flung outward In real life, the main flow is inward and upward

Tornado Strength Cannot Be Predicted in Advance, Media Hype Not Withstanding

• In Twister, during a flashback at the start of the film, the characters claim that the National Severe Storms Laboratory was predicting an F5 tornado… There are two problems with that: – The flashback takes place in 1969, but the Fujita scale wasn’t developed until 1971 – F (and later EF) values aren’t determined until post disaster surveys • AIR’s severe thunderstorm model (which is undergoing a major update) takes into account the EF scale when calculating damage

A New Intensity Scale for Tornadoes Is Under Consideration

• You may have heard rumors from the SPC and NWS about their adoption of the new “Moojita scale”

• M0: Cows become mildly annoyed

• M1: Cows are tipped over and cannot get up

• M2: Cows begin rolling in the wind

• M3: Cows tumble and bounce

• M4: Cows become airborne

• M5: Steak tartare

Outbreak Is a Classic Movie About a Pandemic Virus

• In the film Outbreak, an Ebola-like virus mutates rapidly into an airborne “100% lethal” strain

• Dustin Hoffman’s character has to search for the monkey that started the outbreak, in order to create an antiserum cure

Viruses and Their Mutations Are Too Small to Be Seen with a Standard Desktop Microscope

• Electron microscopes are required to see these tiny particles, yet a standard microscope is used in the film • The scientists are able to determine that the virus has mutated, just by looking at it with a microscope • The Ebola virus is about 800 nanometers long and 80 nm wide

The “Cure” Is Developed Too Quickly

• Once the main characters capture the monkey responsible for the outbreak, a cure is developed within hours • Even the H1N1 vaccine, for the influenza virus which has been well studied, took months • AIR’s upcoming pandemic flu model will include more reasonable assumptions

The Film 2012 Is Full of Tsunamis

Tsunami breaking over Mount Everest in the Himalayas

Tsunami destroying the White Tsunami in the open ocean House in Washington causing a ship to capsize

At Least the Movie Didn’t Claim this Alternate Theory of Tsunami Generation

Tsunamis Move Very Fast, but Have Low Amplitude Over Open Water

• Tsunami waves are not like wind- generated waves

• They are long wavelength (shallow water) waves

• Shallow water waves propagate in all directions

• Although it moves like a jet airplane over deep ocean, the wave has a small amplitude (~1/2 m) and is hardly noticeable

Rogue Waves Portrayed in Poseidon Do Exist

• Rogue waves have long been part of seafaring legend

• In 1995, the first rogue wave was scientifically measured, so the premise of the Poseidon remake (2006) is plausible!

• The original wave in The Poseidon Adventure (1972) was a tsunami

2012 Also Features a Pole Reversal, Something that Is Not Implausible

• Toward the end of the movie, the characters comment that the new “South Pole” is somewhere over Wisconsin • Pole reversals have happened regularly, every 0.1 to 1 million years, and can be evidenced along the sea floor • Navigation and communications would be severely disrupted

Yellowstone Blows in 2012

• The Yellowstone super-volcano erupts in the movie • The heroes of the story are quite close, as seen in the screenshot below, yet (spoiler alert) somehow survive the blast by taking off in an airplane

Yellowstone Tends to Erupt Every 600,000 to 700,000 Years… It Has Been 630,000 Years Since It Last Erupted

Is a Mega-Tsunami on the East Coast of the U.S. Possible?

• Another disaster movie? – No

• Is it possible? – Some scientists believe so

• Cumbre Vieja volcano on La Palma in the Canary Islands is susceptible to a major landslide

• 160-foot waves traveling 4+ miles inland

• 6 hours warning in the U.S.

Something a Little More Cheery for East Coasters

Spring is here!

Summary

• Disaster movies tend to bend the rules of science • Much can be learned by studying these films – and generally believing the opposite of what they show • AIR staff watch these movies for entertainment, not to help develop our catastrophe models • If you know anyone in Hollywood, our staff is eager and willing to do consulting work on upcoming disaster films