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A hypothetical magnitude-9.3 earthquake near Alaska’s eastern Aleutian Islands could bring a damaging tsunami to the San Francisco Bay Area in about five hours, and to L.A. and Orange counties in about six.

During the winter the ocean cools and the so-called “Aleutian Low” expands south from Alaska, freeing a path for atmospheric rivers to bring rain to the West Coast.

In the northern Pacific Ocean, undersea slopes leading to the Aleutian Trench are believed to teem with worms, clams, anemones, and countless microbes thriving on methane bubbling up from the sediment.

Along the West Coast, marbled murrelets are found regularly from Santa Cruz, California, to the Aleutian Islands.

For instance, song sparrows that live year-round in the Aleutian Islands can be up to three times larger than their counterparts in the coastal marshes of California.