1. Class Agenda
EQ: How can we learn from the past if people weren’t recording data back then? LT: Analyze information with “Crosscutting Concepts” to solve historical mysteries. SC: Complete the investigation using “Cross Cutting Concepts(CCC)”

2. Initial Thoughts:
How did ancient humans record information or pass along stories for future generations?
2. What types of information can be used as historical data if humans were not writing data records for climate and nature in the past?
3. Why were people warned not to go on Washington/Oregon beaches after the 9.0 Mega Earthquake in Japan on March 11th, 2011?

3. INTRODUCTION: IN Teams of 3
Write 3 predictions on your worksheet for what could have caused these mysterious disasters.
Share your mystery with your team
Read 1 of 3 mysteries that confused scientists for a long time. One occurred in Japan, another was on the Washington coast and the third was in Oregon.

4. PART 1: How Do Scientists investigate to solve historical mysteries?
Geologists are trying to understand what causes natural disasters so they can warn people in advance of potential disasters and how to survive in them. They have many questions to investigate.
DISCUSS WITH YOUR TEAM :
How do they get their questions answered?
What types of information (Data) are available?
What types of information (Data) are not available?

5. How Do Scientists investigate to solve historical mysteries?
Information we don’t have:
Humans have not been keeping written record for very long. Nor have they been recording quantitative data for very long.
Examples: temperature, rainfall, earthquake magnitude, tsunami height etc.

6. How Do Scientists investigate to solve historical mysteries?
Nuu-chah-nulth story of how the Pachena Bay village
Disappeared
Information we do have: Oral and written records from indigenous people can be used as qualitative data. Local knowledge can also be a good replacement for scientific data.

7. Learning from the stories…
“These oral traditions also recount details of past natural catastrophes, including earthquakes and tsunamis, that affected this region. Although they may not meet modern standards of scientific rigor for the study of such phenomena, the oral histories reflect the experiences and perceptions of aboriginal peoples in their lengthy occupation of this land. They provide, along with the archaeological record of the Native past, our only insights into the impact of past seismic events on human populations in this region prior to about two hundred years ago.”
McMillan, Alan D. etal., When the Mountain Dwarfs Danced: Aboriginal Traditions of Paleoseismic Events along the Cascadia Subduction Zone of Western North America Ethnohistory 49:I (winter 2002) Copyright © by the American Society for Ethnohistory.

8. Follow the link on whatsyourscience.com to listen to the tale

9. Discuss & Answer the Questions for Part 1
How can oral stories help scientists find the cause of natural disasters?
What types of information should they be looking for?

10. Part 2 Scientists use these “Cross Cutting Concepts”
Patterns
Structure & Function
Cause & Effect
Energy & Matter
Systems & System Models
* Structure & function, and Energy & Matter are good for developing models to understand how something works
Scale, Proportion, & Quantity
Stability & Change
As a team, discuss which 2 skills you should use to investigate these mysteries? Prepare to report to and explain why these are good skills for this project by answering the questions for part 2.

11. Part 3 Let’s see what scientists did…
Geologists collected a lot of data in soil samples and tree ring samples to look for “Patterns.” They still could not solve the mystery. They decided to change their perspective. First they had to think about what they did know so they could identify what they didn’t know. This helped them ask better questions. The next 2 slides will remind you of what we do know.

12. They knew the Earth’s surface can change because of Continental Drift.

13. They knew the West coast has a lot of geological activity based on the data collected at seismic monitoring stations.

14. They predicted the mysteries had to be related to plate movement in someway.

15. Review this list and discuss with your group which thinking skill would be better for investigating this problem?
Patterns
Cause & Effect
Systems & System Models
Scale, Proportion, & Quantity
Stability & Change

16. Let’s see what scientists did…
When they changed their strategy to use “Systems Thinking,” to discover “Patterns,” it became easy to identify the “Cause and Effect.” Go back one slide and review the list of “Earth Science Literacy Principles” and answer the questions on your worksheet for Part 3. WHEN DONE COMPLETE YOUR MIDDLE CHECK

17. Are they myth or real stories?
PART 4 UsE Systems Thinking to look for patterns in the resources that will help you compare and contrast events to determine cause and effect.
Use the next slide resources to analyze the validity of the oral histories:
Are they myth or real stories?
~Take notes on your team discussions as a scientific detective would

18. 40 Stories collected from different tribes along the coast.

19. Coastal Cascadia Oral Histories
Ludwin was a seismologist from University of Washington. In addition to this work investigating Native American oral traditions for seismic information, she has also used native stories to help identify landslide locations in the Seattle Fault area. The Ludwin et al 2005 paper (Earthquakes and tsunami as elements of environmental disturbance on the Northwest Coast of North America) compiled Native American oral histories along the Cascadia subduction zone and used them to estimate a feasible time period for which the last large Cascadia earthquake-tsunami event occurred.
Source locations of accounts of earthquake-tsunami stories. Recorded (Ludwin et al 2005)

20. Coastal Cascadia Oral Histories
Tree-ring & Japanese-record estimated event time of January , 9 pm
Geoscience research and Japanese histories give an estimated time of January 26th 1700, 9pm. For a explanation of this work, see IRIS Animations “Orphan Tsunami” animation (
Of the 32 oral histories included, 9 had temporal information that allowed for an estimated time since the last major event. Using standard assumptions (listed below) about duration of a generation and age at which memories are retained, Ludwin et al determined an estimated event time of 1690 AD.
Several of the tellers of these stories were careful to specify that these were not ancient myths but actual events to actual people.
Other included details also match our scientific understanding of the event such as accounts of season specifying winter and time of day is mostly given as night. Stories collected
Assumptions for narrowing date range
--generation is years
--people do not remember events prior to 5 years age
--maximum age possible is 100 years
--someone described as “old” is at least 40 years
Oral-history-estimated event time of 1690 AD

21. UsE Systems Thinking to look for patterns in the resources that will help you compare and contrast events to determine cause and effect.
Use these resources: (Modern Day Megaquakes for comparison)
Sendai Japan March 11th 2011 Tsunami strike simulation video
Sendai Japan March 11th 2011 Mega Quake Vertical & Horizontal Displacement data
Honshu Tsunami Simulation

22. Damage in Copalis Beach from 1964 Alaska Tsunami
Bridge over Copalis River destroyed.
“Distant” tsunami: A tsunami generated by a distant earthquake (e.g. Alaska 1964; Japan 2011). The first waves will arrive several hours after the earthquake and may arrive for many hours thereafter.

23. Some Coast Areas Now Below Sea Level
Yuriage
Before After
Some areas that were above sea level on march 10 dropped below sea level on March 11, 2011.
This also happened along the Washington - Oregon coast during the 1700 AD great Cascadia earthquake.

24. Pacific Ocean Tsunami Generated by Alaska Earthquake
About four hours travel time to Washington and Oregon Coast.
Tsunami from 1964 Alaska EQ killed 4 children on Beverly Beach. The largest of 28 distant tsunamis to affect Oregon coast since 1854.
Significant damage in Seaside and Cannon Beach, OR. Major destruction and 13 deaths in Crescent City, CA.

25. Drowned Forests of Coastal Oregon and Washington
David Yamaguchi
Trees in “drowned forests” near shore died when the ground dropped and seawater killed the trees. Compare rings from victim trees with rings from witness trees on higher ground.
Result: Trees died between fall 1699 and spring 1700.

26. Three-Layer Cake of Cascadia Tsunami Geology
Cupcake Geology
Niawiakum River east of Willapa Bay
Organic-rich forest soil covered by tsunami sand then intertidal mud and clay on top.

27. Cascadia Tsunami Geology
Multiple sand layers.
One for each wave of the tsunami!
inland
Clump of marsh grass

28. PART 4 UsE Systems Thinking to look for patterns in the resources that will help you compare and contrast events to determine cause and effect.
Use these resources and the following slides:
(Copalis Ghost Forest clues soil & tree samples)
Clues to solve the Ghost Forest Mystery
Ghost Forest Formation

29. REVISED THOUGHTS Catastrophic Mysteries
What was surprising about the cause of the 3 natural disasters?
What did you already know about earthquakes and tsunamis but see in a new way?
What do you still need help with understanding earthquakes and tsunamis better?
COMPLETE YOUR END CHECK