The biggest wave in the world is how many meters. The largest tsunamis in the world: wave height, causes and consequences
A tsunami is a wave moving a large amount of water throughout its depth, caused by an impact on the entire thickness of the water. Cause more
Tsunamis often cause significant casualties for several reasons:
During a storm, only the surface layer of water begins to move; during a tsunami, the entire thickness moves. And during a tsunami, much larger masses of water splash onto the shore.
The speed of tsunami waves, even near the shore, exceeds the speed of wind waves. Tsunami waves have more kinetic energy.
A tsunami, as a rule, generates not one, but several waves. The first wave, not necessarily the largest, wets the surface, reducing resistance for subsequent waves.
The strength of a tsunami can increase in the harbor - where wind waves are weakened, and therefore residential buildings can be located close to the shore.
Lack of basic knowledge among the population about possible dangers. Thus, during the 2004 tsunami, when the sea retreated from the coast, many local residents remained on the shore - out of curiosity or out of a desire to collect fish that had not managed to escape. In addition, after the first wave, many returned to their homes to assess the damage or try to find loved ones, unaware of subsequent waves.
1 Tsunami that occurred on December 26, 2004 Southeast Asia.
At 00:58, a powerful earthquake occurred - the second most powerful of all recorded (magnitude 9.3), which caused the most powerful tsunami of all known.
The tsunami affected Asian countries (Indonesia - 180 thousand people, Sri Lanka - 31-39 thousand people, Thailand - more than 5 thousand people, etc.) and African Somalia. The total number of deaths exceeded 235 thousand people.
2 Tsunami that occurred on March 28, 1964 Alaska, (USA).
The largest earthquake in Alaska (magnitude 9.2), which occurred in Prince William Sound, caused a tsunami of several waves, with the highest height being 67 meters. As a result of the disaster (mainly due to the tsunami), according to various estimates, from 120 to 150 people died.
3 Tsunami that occurred on July 9, 1958, Lituya Bay, (southwest Alaska, USA).
An earthquake that occurred north of the bay (on the Fairweather Fault) initiated a strong landslide on the slope of the mountain located above Lituya Bay (about 300 million cubic meters of earth, rocks and ice). All this mass overwhelmed the northern part of the bay and caused a huge wave 52.4 meters high, moving at a speed of 160 km/h.
4 Tsunami that occurred on January 09, 2005, Izu and Miyake Islands (eastern Japan)
An earthquake of magnitude 6.8 caused a tsunami with a wave height of 30-50 m. However, thanks to timely warning, the population was evacuated from dangerous areas.
Caused by a powerful earthquake (magnitude estimates from various sources range from 8.3 to 9), which occurred in the Pacific Ocean 130 kilometers from the coast of Kamchatka. Three waves up to 15-18 meters high (according to various sources) destroyed the city of Severo-Kurilsk and caused damage to a number of other settlements. According to official data, more than two thousand people died.
6 Tsunami that occurred on March 9, 1957 Alaska, (USA).
Caused by a magnitude 9.1 earthquake that occurred in the Andrean Islands (Alaska), which caused two waves, with average wave heights of 15 and 8 meters, respectively. In addition, as a result of the earthquake, the Vsevidov volcano, located in Umnak and which had not erupted for about 200 years, woke up. More than 300 people died in the disaster.
7 Tsunami that occurred on 07/17/1998 Papua New Guinea
A magnitude 7.1 earthquake off the northwestern coast of New Guinea triggered a massive underwater landslide that generated a tsunami that killed more than 2,000 people.
8 Tsunami that happened on 02/27/2010 Concepción Chile
Tremors with a magnitude of 8.8 were recorded at 03.34 local time 115 kilometers north of the central city of Concepcion. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center reported that the tremors triggered a tsunami. Experts specify that the wave height reached almost three meters. The number of victims reached 100 people.
9 Tsunami that occurred on April 2, 2007 Solomon Islands (archipelago)
Caused by a magnitude 8 earthquake that occurred in the South Pacific. Waves several meters high reached New Guinea. 52 people became victims of the tsunami.
10 Tsunami that occurred on 09/06/2004 on the coast of Japan
110 km from the coast of the Kii Peninsula and 130 km from the coast of Kochi Prefecture, two strong earthquakes occurred (magnitudes up to 6.8 and 7.3, respectively), causing a tsunami with wave heights of up to one meter. Several dozen people were injured.
Megatsunami in Lituya Bay, Alaska, USA - the most destructive wave in the world (its length is more than 500 meters). The disaster occurred in 1958 on July 9. It was the largest natural disaster known to science. A little later, scientists called the phenomenon a “megatsunami.”
Causes of the disaster
The giant wave was caused by a magnitude 8 earthquake off the Alaska Peninsula. The tremors triggered a huge landslide that dumped a massive glacier and piles of rock into Gilbert Bay. They became the main reason for the emergence of a giant wave.
Consequences of the disaster
Major casualties were avoided: ten fishermen were killed and vegetation along the coast was destroyed. Eyewitness accounts say that “the mountains were shaking terribly, the stones were rapidly rushing down, then suddenly they disappeared, and a giant wall of water appeared.”
Presumably, similar tsunamis have occurred here before, with an interval of several decades. The tsunamis that occurred were also quite high, but their effects were finally eliminated by a natural disaster in 1958.
Next megatsunami
The Lituya megatsunami was the first time in science that a giant wave was caused not only by an earthquake, but also by a landslide.
One of the strongest tsunamis was the aftermath of the Indian Ocean earthquake on December 26, 2004. This is the deadliest, natural disaster in modern history. The destructive wave dealt a huge blow to Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Somalia. The capital of the Maldives, Male, was very badly damaged during the tsunami. Certain areas of the city had to be rebuilt.
The death toll as a result of the natural disaster is estimated at 235 thousand people.
It is sad that many of the victims were tourists vacationing on the shores of Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia.
In Japanese, the character “tsu” is a bay or bay, “nami” is a wave. Together, both hieroglyphs translate as “wave flooding the bay.” The catastrophic consequences of two tsunamis that hit the shores of the Indian Ocean in 2004 and Japan in 2011 clearly demonstrated that reliable protection against this formidable natural phenomenon has not yet been found...
Tsunami - what is it?
Contrary to popular belief, a tsunami is not one gigantic wave that suddenly hits the shore and sweeps away everything in its path. In fact, a tsunami is a series of sea gravity waves of very long length, resulting from the displacement of extended sections of the bottom during strong underwater earthquakes or, occasionally, for other reasons - as a result of volcanic eruptions, giant landslides, asteroid falls, underwater nuclear explosions.
How does a tsunami occur?
The most common cause of a tsunami is vertical movement of the bottom during underwater earthquakes. When part of the bottom sinks and part rises, the mass of water begins to oscillate. In this case, the water surface tends to return to its original level - the average ocean level - and thus generates a series of waves.
The speed of tsunami propagation at a sea depth of 4.5 km exceeds 800 km/h. But the wave height in the open sea is usually small - less than a meter, and the distance between the crests is several hundred kilometers, so a tsunami is not so easy to notice from the deck of a ship or from an airplane. In the vast oceans, encountering a tsunami is not dangerous for any ship. But when waves enter shallow water, their speed and length decrease, and their height increases sharply. Near the coast, the wave height often exceeds 10 m, and in exceptional cases reaches 30-40 m. Then the impact of the elements causes colossal damage to coastal cities.
However, tsunami waves of relatively low height often cause enormous destruction. At first glance, this seems strange: why do the seemingly more formidable waves that arise during a storm not lead to similar casualties? The fact is that the kinetic energy of a tsunami is much higher than that of wind waves: in the first case, the entire thickness of the water moves, and in the second, only the surface layer. As a result, the pressure of water splashing onto land during a tsunami is many times higher than during a storm.
One more factor should not be discounted. During a storm, the excitement increases gradually, and people usually manage to move to a safe distance before they begin to face danger. A tsunami always comes suddenly.
Today, about 1000 cases of tsunamis are known, of which more than a hundred had catastrophic consequences. Geographically, the periphery of the Pacific Ocean is considered the most dangerous region - approximately 80% of all tsunamis occur there.
It is impossible to completely protect the coast from a tsunami, although some countries, especially Japan, have tried to build breakwaters and breakwaters in order to reduce the force of the waves. However, there are cases when these structures played a negative role: tsunamis destroyed them, and pieces of concrete picked up by water flows only aggravated the damage on the shore. Hopes for protection from trees planted along the shore were also not realized. To dampen the energy of waves, too large an area of forest plantations is needed, and most coastal cities simply do not have that. Well, a narrow strip of trees along the embankment cannot provide any resistance to a tsunami.
One of the important measures to protect the population of dangerous regions from destructive waves was the international tsunami warning system created in the Pacific region. 25 states, including Russia, take part in its work. Scientists from different countries, based on a comprehensive analysis of strong earthquake zones, are trying to determine whether they caused tsunamis in the past, and what is the likelihood of tsunamis occurring in the future. The system's main research center, located in Honolulu, Hawaii, continuously monitors seismic conditions and surface levels in the Pacific Ocean.
In our country, the tsunami warning service of the Far East consists of three regional services: Kamchatka, Sakhalin regions and Primorsky Territory. In the Kamchatka region, in particular, there is a tsunami station of the territorial administration for hydrometeorology and environmental monitoring and a seismic station of the Institute of Earth Physics of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The most destructive tsunamis of the past
It is possible that the most catastrophic tsunami event in human history occurred in ancient times, although it has come down to us in the form of myths and legends. Around 1450 BC. An entire civilization perished from a giant wave triggered by the Santorini volcano. 120 km from the volcano is Crete, which at that time was one of the most powerful powers in the Mediterranean. But the tsunami at one point caused colossal damage to the island of Crete, from which the previously prosperous state was never able to recover. It collapsed, and many of its cities were abandoned for two and a half thousand years.
Giant tsunami waves followed the devastating earthquake in Lisbon on November 1, 1755. The source of the earthquake was obviously at the bottom of the ocean. The total number of victims from the waves and earthquake is estimated at approximately 60 thousand people.
In 1883, as a result of a series of eruptions of the Krakatoa volcano in Indonesia, a powerful tsunami was formed, from which the islands of Java and Sumatra suffered the most. Waves up to 40 m high wiped out about 300 villages from the face of the earth, killing more than 36 thousand people. Near the city of Teluk Betung, a Dutch warship - the gunboat Berouw - was thrown 3 km inland and ended up on a mountainside at an altitude of 9 m above sea level. Seismic waves passed two or three times around the Earth, and unusual red dawns were observed for a long time in Europe from the ash thrown into the atmosphere.
The most destructive tsunami of the 20th century hit the coast of Chile on May 22, 1960. The tsunami and the powerful earthquake that generated it, measuring 9.5 on the Richter scale, killed 2,000 people, injured 3,000, left two million homeless, and caused $550 million in damage. The same tsunami killed 61 people in Hawaii, 20 in the Philippines, 3 in Okinawa and more than 100 in Japan. The wave height on Pitcairn Island reached 13 m, on Hawaii - 12 m.
The most unusual tsunami
In 1958, a tsunami formed in Lituya Bay in Alaska, caused by a giant landslide - about 81 million tons of ice and solid rock fell into the sea as a result of the earthquake. The waves reached an incredible height of 350-500 m - these are the largest waves ever recorded in history! The tsunami washed away all vegetation from the mountain slopes. Fortunately, the shores of the bay were uninhabited, and human casualties were minimal - only two fishermen died.
Tsunami in the Russian Far East
On April 4, 1923, a strong earthquake occurred in the Kamchatka Bay. 15-20 minutes later a wave approached the top of the bay. Two fish factories on the coast were completely destroyed, and the village of Ust-Kamchatsk was severely damaged. The ice on the Kamchatka River was broken over a distance of 7 km. 50 km southwest of the village, the maximum height of water rise on the coast was observed - up to 30 m.
In Russia, the most catastrophic tsunami occurred on the night of November 4–5, 1952 on the Far Eastern island of Paramushir, where the city of Severo-Kurilsk is located. At about 4 a.m., strong tremors began. Half an hour later the earthquake stopped, and the people who had left their homes returned to their homes. Only a few remained outside and noticed the approaching wave. They managed to take refuge in the hills, but when they went down to inspect the destruction and look for relatives, a second, even more powerful wave of water about 15 m high fell on the city. The captain of one tug stationed in the roadstead of Severo-Kurilsk said that that night the sailors did nothing They didn’t notice, but early in the morning they were surprised by the large amount of garbage and various objects floating around. When the morning fog cleared, they saw that there was no city on the shore.
On the same day, the tsunami reached the shores of Kamchatka and caused serious damage to a number of villages. In total, more than 2,000 people died, but in the USSR, until the early 1990s, almost no one knew about the events of that tragic night.
The tsunami that occurred on May 23, 1960, off the coast of Chile, reached the shores of the Kuril Islands and Kamchatka about a day later. The highest level of water rise was 6-7 m, and on the territory of the Khalaktyrsky beach near Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky - 15 m. In Vilyuchinskaya and Russkaya bays, houses were destroyed and outbuildings were washed into the sea.
Indian Ocean disaster (2004)
After an earthquake measuring about 9 on the Richter scale with an epicenter in the northern part of the island of Sumatra in Indonesia, which occurred on the night of December 26, 2004, a powerful tsunami covered the Indian Ocean. The more than 1,000-kilometer fault line, created by the movement of large layers of the earth's crust on the ocean floor, generated a huge release of energy. The waves hit Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh, Myanmar, the Maldives and Seychelles and reached Somalia, located 5 thousand km from the epicenter of the earthquake. More than 300 thousand people became victims of the tsunami, including foreign tourists from many countries who were vacationing in Indonesia and Thailand in those days. Most of the dead were in Indonesia (more than 180 thousand) and Sri Lanka (about 39 thousand).
Such numerous casualties are largely explained by the lack of basic knowledge among the local population about the impending danger. So, when the sea retreated from the shore, many locals and tourists remained on the shore - out of curiosity or out of a desire to collect the fish remaining in the puddles. In addition, after the first wave, many returned to their homes to assess the damage or try to find loved ones, not knowing that others would follow the first wave.
Tsunami in Japan (2011)
The tsunami was caused by a strong earthquake of magnitude 9.0-9.1 that occurred on March 11, 2011 at 14:46 local time (8:46 Moscow time). The center of the earthquake was at a depth of 32 km, at a point with coordinates 38.322° N. 142.369°E east of the island of Honshu, 130 km east of the city of Sendai and 373 km northeast of Tokyo. In Japan, the tsunami caused widespread destruction on the east coast. The maximum wave height was observed in Miyagi Prefecture - 10 m. The tsunami flooded the Sendai airport, washed away one passenger train, and caused serious damage to the Fukushima I nuclear power plant. In Sendai alone, the tsunami caused the death of approximately 300 people. The total damage caused to the country's economy amounts to hundreds of billions of dollars.
According to official data, the death toll from the earthquake and tsunami was 15,892 people, with another 2,576 people listed as missing. 6,152 people were seriously injured. According to unofficial data, the number of victims is much higher. According to media reports, 9,500 people are missing in the city of Minamisanriku alone.
Numerous photographic documents paint a truly apocalyptic picture of destruction:
The tsunami was observed along the entire Pacific coast - from Alaska to Chile, but outside Japan it looked much weaker. Hawaii's tourism infrastructure was hit the hardest - about 200 private yachts and boats were wrecked and sunk in Honolulu alone. On the island of Guam, waves tore two US Navy nuclear submarines from their moorings. In Crescent City, California, more than 30 boats were damaged and one person was killed.
According to the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations, due to the threat of a tsunami on the Kuril Islands, 11 thousand residents were evacuated from coastal areas. The highest wave height - about 3 m - was recorded in the area of the village of Malokurilskoye.
Tsunami in cinema
In the popular genre of disaster films, tsunamis have repeatedly attracted the attention of screenwriters and directors. An example is the feature film “Tsunami” (South Korea, 2009), frames from which are given below.
The article uses photos from U.S. Navy, Wikipedia, Reuters, Kyodo, Yomiuri, Beawiharta, Ulet Ifansasti and SIPA Press.
This is how eyewitness Howard J. Ulrich, who was there on his yacht Edri, described these events. She entered the waters of Lituya Bay at about eight in the evening and anchored at a depth of nine meters in a small cove on the southern coast. Howard says that suddenly the yacht began to rock violently. He ran out onto the deck and saw how in the northeastern part of the bay the rocks began to move due to the earthquake and a huge block of rock began to fall into the water. About two and a half minutes after the earthquake, he heard a deafening sound from the destruction of rock. “We definitely saw that the wave came from Gilbert Bay, just before the earthquake ended. But at first it was not a wave. At first it was more like an explosion, as if the glacier was splitting into pieces. The wave grew from the surface of the water, at first it was almost invisible, who would have thought that then the water would rise to a height of half a kilometer.” Ulrich said that he observed the entire process of development of the wave, which reached their yacht in a very short time - something like two and a half to three minutes, from the time it could first be noticed. Since we didn't want to lose the anchor, we pulled out the entire anchor chain (about 72 meters) and started the engine. Halfway between the northeastern edge of Lituya Bay and Cenotaf Island, a thirty-meter-high wall of water could be seen that stretched from one shore to the other. When the wave approached the northern part of the island, it split into two parts, but after passing the southern part of the island, the wave became one again. It was smooth, only there was a small ridge on top. When this mountain of water approached our yacht, its front was quite steep, and its height was from 15 to 20 meters. Before the wave arrived at the place where our yacht was located, we did not feel any drop in water or other changes, with the exception of a slight vibration that was transmitted through the water from tectonic processes that began to operate during the earthquake. As soon as the wave approached us and began to lift our yacht, the anchor chain crackled violently. The yacht was carried towards the southern shore and then, on the reverse course of the wave, towards the center of the bay. The top of the wave was not very wide, from 7 to 15 meters, and the trailing front was less steep than the leading one. As the giant wave swept past us, the surface of the water returned to its normal level, but we could see a lot of turbulence swirling around the yacht, as well as erratic waves six meters high, which moved from one birch bay to another. These waves did not create any noticeable movement of water from the mouth of the bay to its northeastern part and back. After 25...30 minutes the surface of the bay calmed down. Near the banks one could see many logs, branches and uprooted trees. All this rubbish slowly drifted towards the center of Lituya Bay and towards its mouth. In fact, during the entire incident, Ulrich did not lose control of the yacht. When the Edri approached the entrance to the bay at 11 pm, a normal current could be observed there, which is usually caused by the daily ebb of ocean water. Lucky man. There are simply no other words... Or the Guardian Angel saved him, advising him to take the right actions...
Tsunamis are the largest and most powerful ocean waves that sweep away everything in their path with terrifying force. The peculiarity of such a dangerous natural disaster is the size of the moving wave, its enormous speed, and the gigantic distance between the crests, which reaches tens of kilometers. Tsunamis pose an extreme danger to the coastal zone. Approaching the shore, the wave gains enormous speed, contracts in front of the obstacle, grows significantly in size and deals a crushing and irreparable blow to the land area.
What causes this huge influx of water, which leaves even the tallest and fortified structures no chance of survival? What natural forces can create a water tornado and deprive cities and regions of the right to survive? The movement of tectonic plates and splits in the earth's crust are the worst harbingers of the collapse of a giant stream.
The largest tsunami in the world in the history of mankind
What is the known largest wave in the world? Let's look through the pages of history. The date July 9, 1958 is well remembered by Alaskans. It was this day that became fatal for the Lituya fjord, which is located in the northeastern part of the Gulf of Alaska. The harbinger of the historical event was an earthquake, the strength of which, according to measurements, was equal to 9.1 points. This is what caused the terrifying rockfall, which caused the collapse of rocks and a wave of unprecedented magnitude.
The weather was clear and sunny all day on July 9th. The water level dropped by 1.5 meters, fishermen on ships were fishing (Lituya Bay has always been a favorite place for avid fishermen). Towards evening, around 22:00 local time, a landslide that rolled into the water from a height of 910 meters, followed by huge stones and blocks of ice. The total weight of the mass was approximately 300 million cubic meters. The northern part of the Lituya Bay was completely flooded with water. At the same time, a giant pile of stones was thrown to the opposite side, as a result of which the entire green area of the Fairweather coast was destroyed.
A landslide of this magnitude provoked the appearance of a huge wave, the height of which was 524 meters! This is approximately a building of 200 floors! It was the largest and highest wave in the world. The gigantic force of the ocean water literally washed away Lituya Bay. The tidal wave picked up speed (by this time it had already accelerated to 160 km/h) and rushed towards Cenotaph Island. Terrible landslides simultaneously descended from the mountains to the water, carrying a column of dust and stones. The wave rose to such a size that the foot of the mountain disappeared under it.
Trees and greenery covering the mountain slopes were uprooted and sucked into the water column. The tsunami continually rushed from side to side inside the bay, covering the points of the shallows and sweeping away the forest covers of the high northern mountains on its way. There is no trace left of the La Gaussi spit, which separated the waters of the bay and Gilbert Bay. After everything had calmed down, on the shore one could see catastrophic cracks in the ground, severe destruction and rubble. The buildings erected by the fishermen were completely destroyed. The scale of the disaster was impossible to assess.
This wave claimed the lives of about three hundred thousand people. Only the longboat managed to escape, which by some incredible miracle was thrown out of the bay and thrown over the sandbank. Once on the other side of the mountain, the fishermen were left without a vessel, but were rescued two hours later. The bodies of the fishermen of another longboat were carried away into the abyss of water. They were never found.
Another terrible tragedy
Terrible destruction remained after the tsunami on December 26, 2004 for residents of the Indian Ocean coast. A powerful shock in the ocean caused a disastrous wave. In the depths of the Pacific Ocean, near the island of Sumatra, a fracture of the earth's crust occurred, which provoked a displacement of the bottom over a distance of more than 1000 kilometers. The largest wave that has ever covered the coast was formed from this fault. At first its height was no more than 60 centimeters. But it accelerated, and now a 20-meter shaft was rushing at an insane, unprecedented speed of 800 kilometers per hour towards the islands of Sumatra and Thailand to the east of India and Sri Lanka - to the west! In eight hours, a terrible tsunami, unprecedented in history, flew over the entire coast of the Indian Ocean, and in 24 hours, the entire World Ocean!
The greatest destruction occurred on the shores of Indonesia. The tidal wave buried cities and regions tens of kilometers deep. The islands of Thailand have become a mass grave for tens of thousands of people. Residents of coastal areas had no chance of salvation, since the water blanket held the cities under it for more than 15 minutes. Huge loss of life resulted from the natural disaster. Economic losses were also impossible to calculate. More than 5 million residents were forced to leave their homes, more than one million needed help, and two million people needed new housing. International organizations responded and helped the victims in every possible way.
Disaster in Prince William Sound
Severe, irreparable losses were caused by an earthquake on March 27, 1964 in Prince William Sound (Alaska) measuring 9.2 on the Richter scale. It covered a huge area of 800,000 square kilometers. Such a powerful push from a depth of more than 20 kilometers can be compared to the simultaneous explosion of 12 thousand atomic bombs! The western coast of the United States of America was significantly damaged, which was literally covered by a huge tsunami. The wave reached as far as Antarctica and Japan. Villages and towns, enterprises, and the city of Veldez were wiped off the face of the earth.
The wave swept away everything that came in its way: dams, concrete blocks, houses, buildings, ships in the port. The wave height reached 67 meters! This, of course, is not the largest wave in the world, but it brought a lot of destruction. Fortunately, the deadly stream claimed the lives of approximately 150 people. The number of victims could have been much higher, but due to the sparse population of these places, only 150 local residents died. Considering the area and gigantic power of the stream, they had no chance of survival.
Great East Japan Earthquake
One can only imagine what force of nature destroyed the shores of Japan and brought irreparable losses to its inhabitants. After this disaster, the consequences will be felt for many years. At the junction of the world's two largest lithospheric plates, an earthquake measuring 9.0 on the Richter scale occurred, about twice the magnitude of the tremors caused by the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake. A tragic event of enormous scale is also called the “Great East Japan Earthquake.” In just 20 minutes, a terrifying wave, the height of which exceeded 40 meters, reached the shores of Japan, where a large number of people were located.
About 25 thousand people became victims of the tsunami. This was the largest wave in the history of the Easterners. But this was only the beginning of the disaster. The scale of the tragedy grew every hour after the attack by the powerful flow of the Fokushima-1 nuclear power plant. The power plant system went out of operating mode due to tremors and shock waves. The failure was followed by a meltdown of the reactors in the power units. Today, a zone within a radius of tens of kilometers is a zone of exclusion and disaster. About 400 thousand buildings and structures were destroyed, bridges, railways, highways, airports, ports and shipping stations were destroyed. It will take years to rebuild the country after the terrible disaster brought by the highest wave.
Disaster on the coast of Papua New Guinea
Another disaster struck the coast of Papua New Guinea in July 1998. The earthquake, measuring 7.1 on the measurement scale, triggered by a massive landslide, caused a wave more than 15 meters high, which killed more than 200 thousand people, leaving thousands more homeless on the island. Before the invasion of ocean water, there was a small bay here called Varupu, the waters of which washed two islands, where the Varupu people lived, worked and traded peacefully. Two powerful and unexpected impulses from underground occurred within 30 minutes of each other.
They set in motion a huge shaft, which caused strong waves that swept away several villages along a length of 30 kilometers from the face of New Guinea. Residents of seven more settlements needed medical care and were hospitalized. The sea level in the capital of New Guinea, Rabaul, rose by 6 centimeters. A tidal wave of such magnitude has never been observed before, although in this region local residents often suffer from disasters such as tsunamis and earthquakes. A giant wave destroyed and carried under water an area of more than 100 square kilometers to a depth of 4 meters.
Tsunami in the Philippines
Exactly until August 16, 1976, the small island of Mindanao existed in the oceanic depression of Cotabato. It was the most southern, picturesque and exotic place among all the islands of the Philippines. Local residents could not at all predict that a terrible earthquake measuring 8 on the Richter scale would destroy this stunning place, washed by the seas on all sides. A huge force created a tsunami as a result of an earthquake.
The wave seemed to cut off the entire coastline of Mindanao. Not having time to escape, 5 thousand people died under the shelter of sea water. Approximately 2.5 thousand residents of the island were not found, 9.5 thousand received varying degrees of injury, more than 90 thousand lost their shelter and remained on the street. This was the strongest activity in the history of the Philippine Islands. Scientists who examined the details of the disaster found that the power of such a natural phenomenon caused movements of the water mass, which provoked a shift in the islands of Sulawesi and Borneo. It was the worst and most destructive event in the entire period of the existence of the island of Mindanao.
