Tonga (CU)_According to a source, the Tonga volcano’s enormous eruption in January resulted in a wave that was as tall as the Statue of Liberty.
According to an article this week in Science News, scientists at the University of Bath in the United Kingdom collected data from tide gauges and deep-ocean instruments within a 932-mile radius of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai eruption. The scientists ran nine separate computer models to visualize the eruption’s characteristics using these data. They discovered that the eruption that created initial waves as tall as 295 feet, barely 10 feet short of the Statue of Liberty, best fit the data they had collected.
“This was a really large tsunami,” researcher and civil engineer Mohammad Heidarzadeh told Science News.
Around 7.5 miles in diameter and 4.1 cubic miles of water made up the water displaced by the eruption. The Krakatoa eruption in Indonesia in 1883 was the only time a such phenomenon was ever documented. The explosion also created a global shock wave that sparked further tsunamis. Despite not being quite as large as tsunamis caused by gravity, pressure wave-generated tsunamis are particularly deadly because of their speed, which presents a considerable challenge to many early warning systems.
Heidarzadeh said the underwater volcano’s eruption on January 15 was produced when a lot of saltwater unexpectedly spilled into a hot magma chamber. One-in-a-century event has been used to characterize the ensuing explosion.
According to scientists who spoke with the New York Times, the eruption’s pressure wave created a sonic boom that three times encircled the globe. The explosion had a greater force than the Soviet Tsar Bomba, the heaviest nuclear weapon yet to be detonated, which let off an explosion equivalent to 50 million tons of TNT. According to a NASA assessment, the eruption’s hot gas and ash plume, which rose 36 miles into the air, was “possibly the tallest plume in the satellite record.”
According to Science News, five individuals were killed, and the tsunami caused losses of about $90 million. Science News mostly attributed these relatively low numbers to the distant location of the Pacific volcano.
A nearly unimaginable amount of water vapor was released into the stratosphere as a result of the eruption of the volcano, which was 500 feet under the surface. According to NASA scientists who spoke with NPR, the eruption might take up to ten years to evaporate after releasing water into the stratosphere in the amount of 58,000 Olympic-size swimming pools. Researchers are concerned that this could cause the globe to warm even more.
