The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center will spend $1 million next year to cut to 90 seconds the two to five minutes it now takes to issue a tsunami warning after a major local earthquake.

Scientists say it would take about five minutes or less for an earthquake-generated tsunami off the southeast coast of the Big Island to hit the Ka'u coast. It would take a tsunami about 15 minutes to reach Hilo from the same location.

A major earthquake off the west coast of the Big Island could send a tsunami to the Kona coast within five or six minutes and to the other Hawaiian Islands in 15 to 30 minutes.

"You don't have much time," said Charles "Chip" McCreery, geophysicist-in-charge of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in 'Ewa Beach.

Speeding up the warning time to 90 seconds will require equipment upgrades, new seismographs and more people to staff the center 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

There is a 5 percent chance an earthquake could trigger the giant waves in the next 50 years in Hawai'i, said University of Hawai'i tsunami researcher Gerard Fryer.

But the impact of a large tsunami would be so drastic that government and Civil Defense authorities should be ready, he said.

"The consequences of a tsunami from Mauna Loa are so severe, you have to at least consider the problem," Fryer said, noting new residents on the Kona coast might be unaware of tsunami dangers.

It is unknown when the goal of sending a warning within 90 seconds will be met. In the next year, however, the center will install seismometers and increase its staff from eight to 15 people, McCreery said.

Congress provided the funding to make the 90-second goal possible after the deadly Dec. 26, 2004, Indian Ocean tsunami, McCreery said.

Forty to 50 people died in 1868 when a 7.9-magnitude earthquake and a tsunami destroyed villages along the Ka'u coast.

In 1975, two people were killed after a 7.6 earthquake off Kalapana caused a tsunami that hit the Halape campground, causing $1.4 million worth of damage.