Eruption of a volcano in the Tonga Islands | The threat “generally passed”, says the New Zealand Prime Minister

(Wellington) The tsunami caused by Saturday’s powerful eruption of an undersea volcano in the Tonga islands in the south Pacific Ocean caused significant damage but no casualties, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Sunday, while the threat was declared over.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) clarified late Saturday that the tidal wave threat had “generally passed” for countries bordering the ocean, although slight changes in sea level remain possible for a few hours.

“The tsunami had a significant impact on the northern coastline of Nuku’alofa, with boats and large rocks washed ashore,” but no casualties were reported, Mr.^me Ardern, without specifying whether there had been damage in the other islands of the archipelago.

New Zealand will send a military reconnaissance aircraft to fly over the area on Monday if the volcanic ash cloud permits.

Blinken “deeply worried”

The New Zealand Prime Minister said there was “no significant eruption underway” and the ash had stopped falling.

“Deeply concerned for the people of Tonga who are recovering from the aftermath of a volcanic eruption and tsunami,” tweeted US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, adding that “the United States stands ready to send aid to our Pacific neighbours.

Stunning views from space showed the timing of Friday’s eruption of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai, on one of Tonga’s uninhabited islands: a huge mushroom of smoke and ash, and a wave immediately unleashed.

Waves of 1.2 meters swept through Tonga’s capital, where residents said they fled to higher ground, leaving behind flooded homes as rocks and ash fell from the sky.

“It was a huge explosion,” Tongan resident Mere Taufa, who was at home at the time, told the Stuff news site.

“The ground shook, the whole house shook. It came in waves. My younger brother thought bombs were exploding near our house,” she said. A few minutes later, the water invaded their house, and she saw the wall of a nearby house crumble.

The king of Tonga, Tupou VI, was evacuated from the royal palace of Nuku’alofa and taken to a villa far from the coast.

The eruption triggered tsunamis in the Pacific, with waves of 1.74 meters measured in Chanaral, Chile, more than 10,000 kilometers away, and smaller waves observed along the Pacific coast, the Alaska to Mexico. Waves of about 1.2 meters hit the Pacific coast of Japan.

In Peru, where “abnormal waves” were observed, according to the Civil Defense, the police said they had rescued 23 people on the coast, without specifying in what circumstances.

Shock wave

The United States Geological Institute (USGS) recorded Saturday’s eruption as equivalent to a magnitude 5.8 earthquake at zero depth.

The eruption lasted eight minutes and sent plumes of gas, ash and smoke several miles into the air.

New Zealand scientist Marco Brenna, a senior lecturer at the University of Otago’s School of Geology, called the impact of the eruption “relatively small”, but said another eruption with a much larger impact could not be ruled out.

The eruption was so powerful it was even heard in Alaska, the Institute of Geophysics at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks tweeted.

The weather station in Fife, Scotland, said on Twitter that it was “simply amazing to think of the power that can send shockwaves around the world”, after the eruption caused a jump in its atmospheric pressure graph.

The Hunga-Tonga-Hunga-Ha’apai submarine volcano, located about 65 km from the Tongan capital Nuku’alofa, had emerged during an eruption in 2009, and had spewed so many large boulders and ash into the air in 2015 that a new island two kilometers long by one kilometer wide and 100 meters high was formed when they were deposited.