ICYMI: San Francisco’s much-hyped tsunami turned out to be little more than an imperceptible high tide.
It’s official: The 8.8 magnitude tremor that rattled off the coast of Kamchatka Krai, Russia, on July 30, 2025, is now the strongest, largest earthquake recorded since 2011, per the United States Geological Survey (USGS). Within minutes, global emergency services determined that the tremor was likely to have triggered a tsunami wave. This surge could span across the Pacific Ocean and threaten Japan, Hawaii, the entire West Coast of the United States, and South America, as well as numerous Pacific island nations.
Moderate tsunami waves, most of which were between one and four feet tall, reached Japanese and Hawaiian shorelines within hours of the initial earthquake, causing mild flooding conditions; the tallest tsunami recorded was in Kahului, Maui, Hawaii where a nearly six-foot tsunami wave crashed into the coastline — which was preceded by a 30-foot-plus tide pulling that left boats stranded. Smaller three- and four-foot waves slammed into Northern California Coastlines — Crescent City saw the state’s largest tsunami wave at about four feet tall … that’s reportedly caused a million dollars worth of damages — but any reported damage was mild; no major injuries were reported from the 2025 tsunami, and millions have returned home since all tsunami-related hazards are now lifted as of Thursday, July 31st.
Here in San Francisco, the National Weather Service warned Bay Area residents of a potential tsunami wave of around a foot. What ended up striking was much smaller — thankfully.
Sea level buoys from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recorded less than a foot — actually, only about six inches worth — of change from observed tidal patterns. The buoy located off Point Reyes showed the highest rate of change, with passing surges cataloged at around a foot. Aside from the foot-tall wave that crashed on Crescent City beaches, which saw a similar amplification to those tsunami waves that struck Santa Cruz in 2022 after the Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai eruption, it was a mild affair.
But will it always be that case? No. Absolutely not.
Because San Francisco and the entire Bay Area consist of low-lying regions, many of which are reclaimed wetlands, tsunami waves as small as five-feet tall could spell disaster for the city and region; NOAA’s Sea Level Rise Viewer shows vulnerable areas around Crissy Fields, the Embarcadero, Mission Bay, South of Market, and Bayview could see massive flooding — much of Hunter’s Point would be swallowed by such a tsunami wave.
It’s not a question of if, but when a substantial-sized tsunami wave strikes San Francisco. As we stand right now, we’re woefully underprepared; SF’s network of tsunami sirens was taken offline in 2019 for safety and technology upgrades; as of publishing, they remain disconnected and nonfunctional.
San Francisco has no City-organized tsunami evacuation plan. No tidal barriers to thwart or mitigate the wave are constructed. There’s no vertical tsunami shelter station anywhere in San Francisco. (Granted, there’s only one in the world at the moment — a mult-tiered, 40-foot platform capable of holding 400 people located on Shoalwater Bay Indian Tribe land in Washington — but San Franciscans located along coastal areas remain vulnerable to deadly tsunami flooding).
For many of us in San Francisco, we’re one perfect storm of seismic activity away from seeing our lives swept into the San Francisco Bay. And that, in and of itself, should be unacceptable.
