‘We could see houses and garages and stuff going down the river, there were boats up on the road’
Sixty years ago, in the middle of the night on March 27, 1964, Port Alberni was hit with a tidal wave—what we now call a tsunami. It was Good Friday, and most people were asleep.
The tsunami remains a pivotal event in the history of the Alberni Valley, even though the number of people who experienced it are dwindling. Monrufet is part of the Port Alberni Maritime Heritage Society that has planned a special event on March 27 to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Port Alberni tsunami. He and others will be sharing their stories and encouraging others to come and share theirs as well.
He had to backtrack to Johnston Road. “We could see houses and garages and stuff going down the river. There were boats up on the road. It was quite a while before we could get to my mother’s house.” When he finally made it the next day, he learned the dogs had spent their time on the couch and weren’t affected by the six to eight inches of floodwater that had entered her home.
It was relatives from Seattle frantically asking if she was OK: they had heard about the earthquake in Alaska and the tidal waves that hit Port Alberni. It took a few minutes to calm them down and reassure them that she was fine—her home was well out of the inundation zone.
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