Tsunami Footage Breathtaking, Heartbreaking; West Coast on Tsunami Alert -- Schools Canceled Along Northern California Coast

We just saw some of the video footage trickling in from the epic disaster that hit Japan last night. Unbelievable. Gut-wrenching. Scary as hell. Nice to be safe here in the deep desert. Just called a friend who lives near Half Moon Bay -- he says they've reported an eight-inch...

By Ray Stern

March 11, 2011

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We just saw some of the video footage trickling in from the epic disaster that hit Japan last night.

Unbelievable. Gut-wrenching. Scary as hell.

Nice to be safe here in the deep desert.

Just called a friend who lives near Half Moon Bay -- he says they've reported an eight-inch rise there. Nothing to worry about. But the school district called this morning -- school's canceled. Tsunami Warning Day.

CNN reports that a nuclear plant has been affected, but is "under control."

Reports seem to indicate this won't be as deadly as the 2004 Indonesia tsunami -- but that sounds like wishful thinking, looking at the pictures.

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Ray Stern is the former news editor of Phoenix New Times. He worked as a newspaper reporter in Arizona for more than two decades. He's won numerous awards for his reporting, including the Arizona Press Club's Don Bolles Award for Investigative Journalism.