Volcanic tsunamis

The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa (Indonesian: Letusan Krakatau 1883) in the Sunda Strait occurred from 20 May until 21 October 1883, peaking in the late morning of 27 August when over 70% of the island of Krakatoa and its surrounding archipelago were destroyed as it collapsed into a caldera.

On March 27, 1980, a series of volcanic explosions and pyroclastic flows began at Mount St. Helens in Skamania County, Washington, United States. A series of phreatic blasts occurred from the summit and escalated until a major explosive eruption took place on May 18, 1980, at 8:32 am. The eruption, which had a volcanic explosivity index of 5, was the first to occur in the contiguous United States since the much smaller 1915 eruption of Lassen Peak in California. It has often been considered the most disastrous volcanic eruption in U.S. history.

The 2002 Stromboli tsunami was caused by a volcanic eruption in the Aeolian Islands of Sicily, located on the Tyrrhenian Sea. In May 2002, one of the island's two active volcanoes, called Stromboli, entered a new phase of explosive activity that was initially characterized by gas and ash emission from the summit craters. On 30 December 2002, the seismic network recorded two large collapses of a huge portion of the Sciara del Fuoco, which resulted in the tsunamis. The first landslide was around 13:15 and the second one around 13:23, which lasted for 5–7 minutes. The event caused damages on the eastern coast side of Stromboli and Panarea. These tsunamis have been considered the most violent ones to have struck Stromboli in the past 100 years.

The 2018 Sunda strait tsunami (Indonesian: Tsunami Selat Sunda 2018) occurred on 22 December 2018 at around 21:38 local time after large parts of the southwestern side of Anak Krakatoa collapsed onto its caldera. The landslide spawned a tsunami wave that struck multiple coastal regions in Banten and Lampung, including the tourist destination of Anyer.

The 1975 Hawaii earthquake occurred on November 29 with a moment magnitude of 7.7 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe). The shock affected several of the Hawaiian Islands and resulted in the deaths of two people and up to 28 injured. Significant damage occurred in the southern part of the Big Island totalling $4–4.1 million, and it also triggered a small brief eruption of Kilauea volcano.

Of the many eruptions of Mount Vesuvius, a major stratovolcano in Southern Italy, the best-known is its eruption in 79 AD, which was one of the deadliest in history.

On 15 July 1815, Mount Tambora, a volcano on the island of Sumbawa in present-day Indonesia (then part of the Dutch East Indies), erupted in what is now considered the most powerful volcanic eruption in recorded human history. This eruption, with a volcanic explosivity index (VEI) of 7, ejected 37–45 km (8.9–10.8 cubic miles) of dense-rock equivalent (DRE) material into the atmosphere, and was the most recent confirmed VEI-7 eruption.

The 1868 Hawaiʻi earthquake was the largest recorded in the history of Hawaiʻi island, with an estimated magnitude of 7.9 Mfa and a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). The earthquake occurred at 4 p.m. local time on April 2, 1868, and caused a landslide and tsunami that led to 77 deaths. The aftershock sequence for this event has continued up to the present day.

The Minoan eruption was a catastrophic volcanic eruption that devastated the Aegean island of Thera (also called Santorini) circa 1600 BCE. It destroyed the Minoan settlement at Akrotiri, as well as communities and agricultural areas on nearby islands and the coast of Crete with subsequent earthquakes and paleotsunamis. With a Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI) of 7, it resulted in the ejection of approximately 28–41 km (6.7–9.8 cu mi) of dense-rock equivalent (DRE), the eruption was one of the largest volcanic events in human history. Since tephra from the Minoan eruption serves as a marker horizon in nearly all archaeological sites in the Eastern Mediterranean, its precise date is of high importance and has been fiercely debated among archaeologists and volcanologists for decades, without coming to a definite conclusion.

On 21 August 1986, a limnic eruption at Lake Nyos in northwestern Cameroon killed 1,746 people and 3,500 livestock.