Cause And Effects Of Tsunamis

The 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami was an horrific natural disaster. On Sunday 26th of December 2004 at 7.58 am local time there was an earthquake of a massive magnitude 9 on the Richter scale. The earthquake struck off the northern tip of Sumatra in Indonesia. It was the result of the Indio-Australian Plate subducting below the Eurasian Plate. Indonesia was hit by the tsunami first. Forty-five minutes later it reached Thailand.

The most noticeable difference between a tsunami and a hurricane is the cause of each. A tsunami is the aftermath of an underwater earthquake or volcanic eruption. The force of the earthquake or eruption, along with the moving of the tectonic plates, sends large amounts of water in all directions. The waves can be thousands of feet high when they reach the shoreline. These giant waves can arrive at a moment's notice with no warning. The tsunami is a large natural phenomenon originating from the ocean, but it is not the only phenomenon to start in the ocean.

Tsunamis are caused by earthquakes underneath the ocean, which can results in gigantic waves that cause devastation and change the Earth’s surface by causing radiation and causing underwater landslides. In the article “Is Santa Catalina Island Sinking or Rising?” it describes how an effect of tsunamis. It states, “A tsunami could have struck the coast from Catalina when the underwater landslide occured” (Los Angeles Times 2). Therefore, tsunamis can strike coasts and can create landslides underwater, changing the ocean floor by creating caves and canyons. Also, tsunamis can wear away beaches. When giant waves crash into coasts of masses of land, they can wear away the coast. Finally, tsunamis can cause radiation. In the article “Dangerous Tsunami Threat off U.S. West Coast,” it explains, “It [the tsunami] also damaged a nuclear power plant, causing a meltdown and spreading dangerous radiation in the area” (Los Angeles Times). Consequently, tsunamis can destroy and interfere with human made buildings which may contain toxic gases which may be released into the air and cause damage the environment. Incidentally, damaging the environment can lead to killing plant and animal life, and the Earth in that area could potentially become barren and

Tsunamis occur when an earthquake happens in the ocean and the energy goes to the water creating huge waves. Tsunamis are very dangerous they can be so strong that they wash away the city, harm thousands, and cause hundreds of thousands to billions of dollars in damage. “A giant tsunami along the West Coast would wash away coastal towns, destroy U.S. Highway 101 and cause $70 billion in damage. More than 100 bridges would be lost, power lines toppled and coastal towns isolated. Residents would have as few as 15 minutes’ notice to flee to higher ground, and as many as 10,000 would die” (Dangerous tsunami threat off U.S. West Coast). This shows what kind of damage this geo-process can

The tsunami waves reached heights up to 128 feet at Miyako city and traveled inland as far as six miles. A tsunami is a series of large sea waves caused by a large displacement of water. The tsunami flooded an estimated area of approximately 217 square miles in Japan. The massive waves destroyed large three-story buildings where many people seeked for safety. Within hours of the first tsunami hit Hawaii and set off multiple warning to Canada, Alaska, South America, the United States, the Oregon coast, and the Pacific.

All along the coast of Central America the tsunami was observed. (February 4, 1965, Alaska Earthquake, Rat Islands, Magnitude 8.7) This earthquake was recorded at a magnitude 8.7 and caused a big tsunami of over 10 m on Shemya Island. It barely caused any damage, though. Just two months after the initial shock, an aftershock earthquake at a magnitude of 7.6 hit the same area. (March 28, 2005, Sumatra Earthquake aka Nias Earthquake) Just off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, was a devastating earthquake that killed 1,300 people. A majority of the devastation occurred on the island of Nias. The massive earthquake sparked a panic around countries along the Indian Ocean because there was a massive tsunami just three months earlier in December. ( August 15, 1950, Assam, Tibet Earthquake, Magnitude 8.6) There were at least 780 people who died in this 8.6 magnitude earthquake. Many buildings completely collapsed in areas of Eastern Tibet. Landslides and ground cracks/fractures ended up washing away and entire village. The village of Yedong collapsed into the Yarlung Zangbo River and literally washed

This generated one of the deadliest tsunamis known to mankind, killing over 230,000 people and leaving over two million people displaced. The epicenter of the earthquake was located in the Indian Ocean, right off the west coast of Sumatra. The tectonic plates beneath the ocean floor had been colliding and building up pressure for hundreds of years, until this day when subduction occurred between the Indian and the Burma plates. The process of subduction displaced billions of tons of water, creating waves that traveled towards the shorelines at hundreds of miles per hour and as high as sixty to one hundred feet. There was absolutely no warning for the people of Southeast Asia, as the tsunami progressed quite rapidly. (National Geographic,

Tsunamis occur when there is sudden movement in an extensive body of water such as earthquakes, landslides on the sea floor, major volcanic eruptions or meteorite impacts. The most common source of a tsunami is earthquakes, which are another type of geomorphic hazard that is caused by the friction and stress that tectonic plates put on each other. Tsunamis primarily occur in coastal or island regions where there is a tectonic border or what is known as the ring of fire. As shown in the diagram below the ring of fire is located along the coastal and island regions of the world.As a result of the Pacific Plate diving beneath the Eurasian plate, on March 11, 2011, there were 2 geomorphic hazards, a magnitude-9 earthquake struck north Japan, which caused a deadly tsunami that reached heights of 39 meters. The destructive dilemma was dubbed ‘The Great Sendai Disaster’. The earthquake was caused by multiple centuries of stress on the tectonic plates surrounding the island. The earthquake caused a tsunami that reached the height of 39 meters (128 feet). Japanese scientists had previously discovered that there was another tsunami just like the one in 2011 that took place in 869 AD. But their warning was unhindered. The tsunami, which occurred in 869 AD, was caused by the same tectonic fault as the 2011 tsunami. The epicenter of the earthquake was off the northeast cost of Japan leading to a devastating tsunami that killed many and left many wishing they were. The massive earthquake caused an upward wave that headed towards the city of Sendai. Researches have recently uncovered a thin layer of clay that lubricated the fault zone causing the deadly tectonic slip, thus creating a tsunami that could wipe out an entire city as it did in 2011.The aftermath of the 2011 tsunami and earthquake was not pretty; it caused many deaths, injuries, traumas, financial difficulties, destruction of property, health bills and the destruction of the landscape as a whole. The natural disaster caused nearly 16,000 casualties and there are an estimated 2,500 people still reported missing. Although drowning caused most deaths others include, crushed by debris, suicide and diseases caused by nuclear radiation (cancer) spilled from nuclear

The morning of December 26, the peaceful morning was cut short of by a massive earthquake that struck off Indonesia causing a deadly tsunami The earthquake was described as having the power of 23,000 Hiroshima bombs, reaching a magnitude of 9.0. After the tsunami started it travels 13 countries and left beaches filled

From the case study above we can see that human influences were the main cause in the severity of the impact, but that’s not always the case, physical factors are just as important. This can be seen in the great Sumatra- Andaman earthquake which took place on the 26th of December 2004 and registered a 9.1 magnitude, one of the third biggest recorded quakes. The subduction of the Indo-Australian plate under the Burma plate triggered the tsunami responsible for the greatest loss of life in a tectonic event. A 15-20m slip occurred along 1600km of fault line in two phases over a period of around 3-4 minutes, the longest rupture ever recorded in an earthquake. The focus was located just 30km below sea level, which resulted in serval billion tonnes of water being displaced across

The 2004 Indian Ocean and Tsunami, everyone has heard about this tragic experience before. It is the third-largest earthquake ever recorded on a seismograph and had the longest duration of faulting ever observed, between 8.3 and 10 minutes. A Tsunami is a long high sea wave caused by an earthquake, submarine landslide, or other disturbance. For the book, Wave, there was family of four where the brother, mom and dad went to Thailand to spend their winter break. The daughter had decided to spend her winter break in New York City. In Thailand, there was a Tsunami that had struck the resort where the family had been staying at. The dad and his son went out to go and help others while the mom stayed back in the hotel lobby. Or what was left of it.

The word tsunami comes from a Japanese word meaning “Long harbor waives”. Tsunami is much known and very common in Japan because thousands of Japanese have been killed and some suffered in recent centuries. Tsunami waves generally speaking cause a lot of damages such as, killing people, destroying building, and costing million of dollars. Moreover, a tsunami is a series of great sea waves caused by an underwater earthquake, landslide, or volcanic eruption. The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake that is located on epicenter off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, is actually one of the worst disasters in the history of Indian Ocean that generated by the most powerful 9.0 magnitude earthquake. An aggressive

There is often a lot of confusion between tsunamis and hurricanes. They are both natural disasters that

An average of two tsunamis occur every year through the world that damages the land nearest to it. Also on average every fifteen years a destructive ocean-wide tsunami occurs.

Waves from the beach are completely different than tsunamis since those waves are normal to see rolling in a lake or the ocean but not a tsunami. The waves you see in the ocean or lake are made by wind offshore while tsunamis are made from either an earthquake from the bottom of the ocean or a volcano in the ocean, those waves are also very small when they are compared to the gigantic waves that are called tsunamis. A single tsunami wave in the open can go up to 100 km millimeters across and that can cause a lot of damage since tsunamis waves can rise up to at least fifty feet. The size of how long a tsunami wave can cross is about one thousand American football fields which is 100 km. Like i have said before tsunami waves are gigantic and can travel very far distances, for example a tsunami wave can go about seven hundred km per hour, but when tsunamis are about a meter high if they are in the open ocean or in other words in the middle of the ocean. Once the tsunami wave gets closer to shallower areas near the coastal lines, the tsunami