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Perhaps you could've slightly improved your piece of 'code' before slashing it here, but then anything get plastered around here these days...

Google maps DEM (Digital Elevation Model) is based on SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) data over most of the globe. You can download the original processed data from NASA and apply it to any GIS software of your choice.

Then with a single click of the elevation tool you can raise or lower the global sea level by x meters of your choice. Was playing around with this 7 years ago when the data came out. Now bored of it.

Like some have pointed out already, the flood fill algorithm is a bit pointless since tsunamis don't behave like flood filled algorithms. A more informative map would simply color areas more than a certain height green showing areas that are definitely out of reach of a tsunami of certain height. Then people could at least see where its relatively safe by inputting the maximum wave height. With large tsunamis we do not even have scientific data on how far inland they could actually travel. Some geologists for example speculate that a super tsunami might have swept across the whole of the Australian continent.

There are plenty of sub $100 devices. Using Google Maps in this way will require a license. Check out for alternatives.

I think TechCrunch should do it instead of Google. To be clear, however, this is about the data. It is not about the database. There are several products, both open and closed, that can handle the storage part (just to name a few):
http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/spatial/
http://grass.itc.it/
http://opensourcegis.org/

In the meantime, many businesses are poviding their addresses online and in phone books. Many already link this location to a map so customers may easily get directions. So this is a kind of "Who cares?" scenario.

Open Street Map has a good and growing base of data for the US. Plus they link in to open source or freeware applications that you can load on PDAs, GPS-enabled cell phones, laptops, etc to begin creating traces that can then be turned into map data.

Combine that with Open Source GIS software to query the data source and you're in business.

For this to work, you have to have a huge pool of people willing to drive a lot. Even the big map players (NAVTEQ and TeleAtlas) have problems keeping data up to speed, and they have an army of people driving around double-checking existing street grids.

First on the Power issue: If your can get GPS receivers that run off 12VDC batteries you can always charge them with solar panels. British Petroleum made the panels we use but they have quit that business (they realized they're in the oil business)but hardware stores now have fold-out panels for boating and camping that could do the trick. I'd talk to a dealer about hooking up the panel to a charger instead of direct to the battery to prevent damage.The company I work for use older Novatel DL receivers that run off 12vdc 7amp-hour batteries that can be bought at stores that sell wheelchair or security system batts. I don't recommend the DL system though- it's heavy and cumbersome with no interface to speak of and not supported by Novatel very well. Trimble equipment is tough and designed for this type of work but is expensive. Get a 10-foot pole and stick your antenna on the top with the receiver in a bag or around your neck. You can then take shots by placing the other pole end on the feature or trace at 1 second intervals as you walk trails without signal interference from ground vegetation (I assume there are few trees around those parts)and you should get accuracies to about 10 metres. For the mapping side of things try this: http://opensourcegis.org/ I've never used anything other than ESRI GIS products such as ARCINFO but all you really need is some free CAD software that imports ASCII geographic coordinates.

http://www.geovistastudio.psu.edu/jsp/index.jsp

"GeoVISTA Studio is an open software development environment designed for geospatial data. Studio is a programming-free environment that allows users to quickly build applications for geocomputation and geographic visualization"

http://www.mancke-software.de/wmsClient/

"This is the Home of a Client vor viewing Maps from an WMS (Web Map Server). "

http://www.mindswap.org/2003/PhotoStuff/

"PhotoStuff - An Image Annotation Tool for the Semantic Web"

http://my.unidata.ucar.edu/content/software/idv/in dex.html

"The Integrated Data Viewer (IDV) from Unidata is a Java(TM)-based software framework for analyzing and visualizing geoscience data. The IDV brings together the ability to display and work with satellite imagery, gridded data, surface observations, balloon soundings, NWS WSR-88D Level II and Level III RADAR data, and NOAA National Profiler Network data, all within a unified interface."

http://opensourcegis.org/

"This effort represents an attempt to build a complete index of Open Source / Free GIS related software projects. The effort has some way to go, especially for projects in languages other than English. The definition of GIS has been kept loose to encompass a broad range of projects which deal with spatial data."

For a pretty complete list of Open Source GIS projects out there check http://www.opensourcegis.org . It's suprising how many mature GIS projects there are. Of special interest is Udig which is an effort to pull several of the best together into killer app type form.