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Lisbon Earthquake (Portugal)
Lisbon earthquake of 1755, series of earthquakes that occurred on the morning of Nov. 1, 1755, causing serious damage to the port city of Lisbon, Port., and killing an estimated 60,000 people in Lisbon alone. Violent shaking demolished large public buildings and about 12,000 dwellings. -
Krakatoa Eruption (Java/ Sumatra)
Krakatoa's eruption sent six cubic miles of rock, ash, dust and debris into the atmosphere, darkening the skies and producing vividly colored sunsets and other spectacular effects around the world. -
Good Friday Earthquake (Alaska)
The Great Alaskan earthquake (or Good Friday earthquake), as it's called, collapsed structures, caused tsunamis, and killed about 131 people. On that Friday, the Pacific and North American plates ruptured, releasing around 500 years of stress buildup. The epicentre was 20 km north of Prince William Sound. -
Aleutian Earthquake (Alaska)
The magnitude 8.1 earthquake caused 165 casualties. Wave heights reached an estimated 115 feet in Alaska, and averaged 30 feet in Hawaii, where the tsunami struck without warning nearly 5 hours after the earthquake. -
Great Chilean Earthquake (Chile)
Two hundred deaths were reported here from the tsunami generated just off Chile's coast by the earthquake. Waves as high as 10.7 metres (35 ft) were recorded 10,000 kilometres from the epicenter, and as far away as Japan and the Philippines. The Chilean tsunami caused death and destruction throughout the Pacific. -
Hokkaido Earthquake (Japan
The Hokkaido-Nansei-Oki earthquake on July 12 produced one of the largest tsunamis in Japan's history. At 2217 local time (1317 UTC), the Ms-7.8 quake rocked the west coast of Hokkaido and the small, offshore island of Okushiri in the Sea of Japan, generating a major tsunami. Within 2-5 minutes, extremely large waves engulfed the Okushiri coastline and the central west coast of Hokkaido. Extensive damage occurred on the southern tip of Okushiri Island at the town of Aonae. -
Papua New Guinea Quake (Papua New Guinea)
On July 17, 1998, a 7.0 magnitude (Mw) earthquake struck the island of Papua New Guinea at 5:49 p.m. local time. But the terror for the villagers on the islands was far from over after the ground stopped shaking. Three catastrophic tsunami waves followed—devastating and razing the entire villages of Sissano, Warapu, Arop, and Malomo on the north coast of Papua New Guinea, killing at least 1,600 people, injuring 1,000, and displacing more than 10,000 people. -
Sumatra Earthquake
A powerful undersea earthquake that struck off the coast of Sumatra island, Indonesia, set off the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, also known as the Christmas or Boxing Day tsunami, on Sunday morning, Dec. 26, 2004. The magnitude 9.1 quake ruptured a 900-mile stretch of fault line where the Indian and Australian tectonic plates meet. It was a powerful megathrust quake, occurring where a heavy ocean plate slips under a lighter continental plate. -
Samoa Earthquake (Samoan Islands)
On September 29, 2009, two large earthquakes struck midway between Samoa and American Samoa, a U.S. territory. The earthquakes generated tsunami waves of up to 22 meters (72 feet) that engulfed the shores, killing at least 192 people—149 in Samoa, 34 in American Samoa, and 9 in Niuatoputapu, Tonga. With over $200 million dollars in damages, the islands were ravaged both physically and economically. -
Chile Earthquake (Chile)
Chile earthquake of 2010, severe earthquake that occurred on February 27, 2010, off the coast of south-central Chile, causing widespread damage on land and initiating a tsunami that devastated some coastal areas of the country. Together, the earthquake and tsunami were responsible for more than 500 deaths.The magnitude-8.8 earthquake struck at 3:34 AM. The epicentre was located some 200 miles (325 km) southwest of the Chilean capital. -
Tohoku Earthquake (Japan)
On March 11, 2011, Japan experienced the strongest earthquake in its recorded history. The earthquake struck below the North Pacific Ocean, 130 kilometers (81 miles) east of Sendai, the largest city in the Tohoku region, a northern part of the island of Honshu. The Tohoku earthquake caused a tsunami. A tsunami—Japanese for “harbor wave”—is a series of powerful waves caused by the displacement of a large body of water.