oregonhistoric

10/09/2026

10/09/2026

🌊 BEACH SAFETY ALERT: SNEAKER WAVE THREAT THIS WEEKEND ⚠️

Sunday, October 11 – Monday, October 12, 2026

If you're planning to visit the beach this weekend, please be extra cautious. A MODERATE RISK OF SNEAKER WAVES is expected along the Southern Oregon Coast, including North Bend, Coos Bay, and surrounding coastal areas.

A powerful, long-period ocean swell traveling across the Pacific is expected to arrive late Saturday night into Sunday morning. Wave activity is expected to peak Sunday evening, with hazardous conditions continuing through Monday evening.

⚠️ WHAT MAKES SNEAKER WAVES SO DANGEROUS?

Sneaker waves are unusually powerful waves that suddenly surge much farther up the beach than surrounding waves, often without warning.

Even when the ocean appears calm, a sneaker wave can:

🌊 Knock you off your feet and pull you into the ocean.

🌊 Sweep children, adults, and pets into dangerously cold water.

🌊 Lift and move heavy driftwood logs, potentially crushing or trapping anyone nearby.

🌊 Rush across beaches, rocks, and jetties, catching people completely off guard.

PLEASE TAKE THESE PRECAUTIONS:

✅ Stay well back from the water's edge, even during seemingly calm conditions.

✅ Never turn your back on the ocean.

✅ Keep children and pets close and away from the surf.

✅ Stay off driftwood logs, especially near the water. They can move without warning.

✅ Avoid climbing onto rocks and jetties where unexpected waves can sweep you into the water.

✅ Don't assume a beach is safe simply because the waves look small.

🚨 IF SOMEONE IS SWEPT INTO THE OCEAN: Call 911 immediately. Do not enter the water after them. Keep the person in sight so you can direct emergency responders to their location.

A REMINDER TO OUR COMMUNITY:

Whether you're walking along our beautiful beaches, fishing, exploring tide pools, or simply enjoying the coastline, please respect the ocean this weekend.

Sneaker waves can happen in seconds, and the cold Pacific Ocean leaves very little room for error.

Please share this message with friends, family, and anyone planning to visit the Southern Oregon Coast this weekend. A little extra caution can save a life.

Stay safe, North Bend and Coos Bay! 🌊

02/28/2026

And Golden and Silver Falls State Park, too!

01/14/2026

01/02/2026

12/29/2025

View of Mt. St Helens erupting from Portland, Oregon, 1980.

12/28/2025

Happy 122nd Birthday, North Bend!

Our story started on July 6, 1903, when Louis Jerome Simpson petitioned Oregon’s Secretary of State to incorporate the town site of Yarrow—along with the area his father, Asa Simpson, had already developed at the north bend of Coos Bay. In most cases, incorporation happened quickly. But that year, a packed legislative docket delayed action until December 28, 1903, when Senate Bill 5 officially created the City of North Bend.

Here’s to 122 years of history, community, and coast pride—and to the generations who continue to shape what North Bend is and will become.

12/28/2025

Long before written newspapers, before the first American or European mapmaker ever drew the Pacific Northwest, the Quinault people lived along the ocean where the rainforest meets the sea.
There, elders told stories about a time when the earth would move violently and the ocean would rise higher than cedar trees.
It was not a legend meant to frighten.
It was a warning meant to save.

On the night of January 26, 1700, that warning returned.

Deep beneath the Pacific, along the Cascadia Subduction Zone, a massive earthquake, estimated at magnitude 9.0, ripped through the coastline. It shook the land for minutes.
Not seconds.
Minutes.

Quinault oral history tells of families waking to shaking earth, swaying trees, and a rumbling sound so deep it felt like the ground itself was crying out.
Dogs barked.
Cooking racks collapsed.
Fires toppled from their pits.

Then the ocean changed.

The tide pulled back so far that the beach widened beyond anything anyone had ever seen. Fish flopped on bare sand. The sea animals cried out. The night became unnaturally silent.

And that was when the elders shouted the teaching:

"To the forest, go now!"

Families grabbed their children and ran toward the tree line, climbing into the high ridges and foothills above the beach. Some carried blankets, some carried nothing. In the dark, through shaking ground and falling branches, they pushed uphill until they reached the safety of the old-growth forest.

Minutes later, the tsunami arrived.

It roared across the shoreline with the force of a wall of water taller than any cedar house. Villages along the lowlands were smashed to pieces. Canoes were splintered. The water carried away everything that had not moved to high ground.

When dawn came, survivors looked down from the forest ridge and saw only debris where their homes had stood.

But the people lived.

Because they remembered.

Quinault, Hoh, Makah, Yurok, and other coastal nations have kept versions of this story for more than 300 years. Scientists later confirmed that the tsunami reached Japan, where scribes recorded an "orphan wave," a giant flood with no local earthquake.

The earthquake had come from the other side of the world.
And Indigenous people living on that coastline had already survived it.

For the Quinault, the story is not just history.
It is proof that ancestral teachings, carried across generations, can save entire communities when the world changes in an instant.