Tsunamis with waves of 15 metres or more from 1950 to 1999

Map of 15 locations · Worldwide

A historical run of tsunamis recorded in the second half of the twentieth century whose highest measured water reached at least fifteen metres. The waves here were raised by different things: subduction-zone earthquakes, rockfalls and landslides into bays and reservoirs, a volcanic eruption under a caldera lake, and a gas release from a crater lake. Each pin marks the source of the wave, the epicentre, slide or vent, rather than the coast the water struck.

Places in this collection

  • 1998 Papua New Guinea tsunami — An undersea earthquake on 17 July struck about 18 miles, or 29 kilometres, off the northwest coast of Papua New Guinea, and the wave came a…
  • 1996 Karymskoye Lake eruption — A sublacustrine, Surtseyan-type eruption in Karymskoye caldera lake on 2 and 3 January included a series of underwater explosions. The lake…
  • 1993 Okushiri earthquake — Known in Japan as the Hokkaido Nansei-oki earthquake, the shock occurred in the Sea of Japan near the island of Hokkaido at about 10:17 p.m…
  • 1992 Flores earthquake and tsunami — The earthquake struck on 12 December on the island of Flores in Indonesia, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX, and was accompanied by…
  • 1986 Lake Nyos disaster — A limnic eruption at Lake Nyos in northwestern Cameroon on 21 August released roughly 1.6 million tons of carbon dioxide from the crater la…
  • 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens — The eruption of the Washington volcano on 18 May was accompanied by a massive landslide, and the catalogue attributes the resulting wave to…
  • 1977 Sumba earthquake — Also called the Sumbawa earthquake, the shock occurred beneath the Indian Ocean about 290 kilometres south of Bima, Sumbawa, near the south…
  • 1965 Yate landslide — A non-eruptive landslide of ice and rock, brought on by unusually heavy summer rains, slid rapidly into a narrow gully on the Chilean volca…
  • 1964 Great Alaska earthquake — The rupture ran along a fault between the Pacific and North American plates about 14 miles beneath the seafloor of Prince William Sound, on…
  • 1963 Vajont Dam disaster — At 22:39 local time on 9 October a landslide of some 270 million cubic metres of rock and debris came off the slope of Mt. Toc and collapse…
  • 1960 Valdivia earthquake — The rupture occurred off the coast of south central Chile and generated a tsunami that was destructive along the Chilean coast and caused c…
  • 1957 Andreanof Islands earthquake — The rupture occurred south of the Andreanof Islands group in the Aleutian arc at 04:22 local time on 9 March, with a maximum Modified Merca…
  • 1956 Amorgos earthquake — The epicentre lay south of Amorgos, the easternmost island of the Cyclades in the Aegean Sea. The quake struck at 5:11 a.m. local time on 9…
  • 1953 Suva earthquake — The earthquake struck just off the southeast shore of Viti Levu, near Suva, with the shaking itself killing three people and seriously inju…
  • 1952 Severo-Kurilsk earthquake — The shock struck off the coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula at 04:58 local time on 5 November and triggered a tsunami that reached the Kuril…

Related collections