Volcano Eruption in Tonga : A massive volcanic eruption in Tonga triggered tsunami waves around the Pacific, causing "significant damage" to the island nation's capital and burying it in dust, but communications were still intact on Sunday. The full extent of the closure was not clear.
Saturday's eruption was so powerful it was recorded around the world, triggering a tsunami that flooded the Pacific coast from Japan to the United States.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said there had been "significant" damage to the capital Nuku'alofa, adding that there were no reports of injuries or deaths, but a full assessment down the communication lines was not yet possible.
"The tsunami has had a significant impact on the north shore of Nuku'alofa with boats and large boulders on the coast," Ardern said after contact with the New Zealand embassy in Tonga.
"Nuku'alofa is covered by a thick layer of volcanic dust, but otherwise conditions are calm and stable."
Tonga needed a water supply, she said: "The ash cloud has caused contamination."
There was no word on damage in the outer islands and a New Zealand Air Force reconnaissance aircraft "as soon as atmospheric conditions allow," the New Zealand Defense Force tweeted.
The United States was "very concerned for the people of Tonga," said Secretary of State Antony Blinken, pledging support for the island nation.
A 1.2-metre wave swept the shore in the Tongan capital, with residents reporting that they had fled to higher ground, leaving flooded houses, with some structural damage, as small boulders and ash fell from the sky.
"It was huge, the ground was shaking, our house was shaking. It came in waves. My younger brother thought the bombs were detonating," resident Mere Taufa, a resident, told the Stuff news website on Saturday.
He said that their house was flooded minutes later and he saw the wall of a neighboring house falling.
What Can Happen Now
We are still in the middle of this major eruption sequence and many aspects remain unclear, partly because the island is currently covered with clouds of ash.
The two earlier eruptions, on 20 December 2021 and 13 January 2022, were of medium size. They formed clouds up to a height of 17 km and added new land to the combined island of 2014/15.
The latest eruption has increased the scale of the violence. The ash pile is already about 20 km high. Most notably, it spread almost concentrically over a distance of 130 km from the volcano, forming a plume with a diameter of 260 km, before being distorted by the wind.
It displays an enormous explosive force – which cannot be explained by magma-water interactions alone. Instead it shows that a large amount of fresh, gas-charged magma has erupted from the caldera.
The explosion also caused tsunamis in Tonga and neighboring Fiji and Samoa. The shock waves lasted for several thousand kilometers, were seen from space, and were recorded in New Zealand about 2000 km away. Soon after the eruption began, the sky over Tongatapu was blocked, causing ash to fall.
All these signs suggest that the Greater Hunga Caldera has woken up. Tsunamis are generated by coupled atmospheric and ocean shock waves during an eruption, but they are also easily caused by submarine landslides and caldera collapses.
It is not clear whether this is the climax of the explosion. This represents a major magma pressure release, which can settle the system.
One caveat, however, lies in the geological deposits from the volcano's past eruptions. These complex sequences suggest that each of the 1000-year major caldera eruption episodes consisted of many different eruption events.
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