Andrew Fish

2004 Tsunami

The Tsunami

A major underwater earthquake took place on December 26, 2004 off the coast of
Sumatra, Indonesia. This was a very widespread disastrous event that killed over
225,000 people amongst eleven different nations. The major countries that were most
effected by one of the most deadly natural disasters in recent history are Indonesia, Sri
Lanka, India and Thailand. Putting the severity of this tsunami into perspective, the
seismograph tool, which measures the intensity of these tsunamis, rated this occurance a
9.1, the second strongest ever recorded. The strongest was a 9.3, which in retrospect is
fairly close to the 9.1 that occurred in 2004. According to historical research, serious
earthquakes occur once per year. One strange aspect of this specific earthquake is that is
occurred exactly one year, to the day, of another major earthquake that occurred one year
previous, December 26, 2003.

How it was caused

The Tsunami was caused by a earthquake that took place in the Indian Ocean near the
northern coast of the island of Sumatra. It occurred more than 19 miles below sea level
was the result of the India Tectonic Plate sliding beneath the Burma Tectonic Plate.
Occurring over the course of multiple minutes, the force could be felt far from where the
action was taking place. Countries like Bangladesh, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, and
the Maldives could all feel force. As the tectonic plates underwent a shift, the bed of the
ocean was forced to rise which displaced a massive amount of ocean water. Some
sources claim that seven cubic miles of ocean water was displaced by the slip which were
the ignition of the massive tsunami. As the depth of the ocean lessened, the waves
became steeper, bigger, and way more powerful. By the time the water was shallow, the
wave reached a height of 30 meters, just few too many meters to surf. (Just kidding, I do
not think anyone will ever surf a tsunami!) To put this force into perspective, Tad Murty,
Vice President of the world renown Tsunami Society, estimated the force of these waves
as being equivalent to almost 5megatons of TNT explosive. This is a larger level force
than all explosives used during the entire World War II, a war in which two atomic bombs
were dropped. An interesting thing about tsunamis is the time it takes to reach a
coastline. For example, Sri Lanka and Sumatra were hit almost immediately, within 1
hour of the Earthquake itself. Other countries, like Somalia for example was hit more
than seven hours after the earthquake. Just because it takes longer for the tsunami wave
to travel a certain distance, that does not necessarily mean that the force, pressure, and
size of the waves is greatly reduced.

Why was it such a surprise?

Unfortunately, prior to this horrific natural disaster, there were no tsunami warnings set in
place within the Indian Ocean. This is mainly because tsunamis are very hard to track in
deep water because their size and mangnitude does not grow huge until it reaches much
more shallow water levels. It is also difficult because calculating where will effected is a
great challenge. The force of a tsunami can travel hundreds of thousands of miles, this
implies great efforts to let everyone who may be effected by a tsunami to make aware of
the issue. However, an interesting characteristic of a tsunami is how the ocean tides
recedes from the coast and children and local people often trek into the shallow waters in
awe and to catch the stranded fish that did not make it back with the shoreline.
Unfortunately, part of the reason it was such a major catastrophic event is because the
warnings signs are so unpredictable. In reality, it was about 4 major waves that did the
most damage. Each wave occurred 30 minutes apart from each other, with the third wave
being by far the most powerful wave.

The Damage

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the death toll from this Tsunami was about
229,866 people. If categorized as a tsunami instead of an earthquake, this is
characterized as the most deadly tsunami ever in history. Since many of the places where
the Tsunami was hit are stricken by poverty, there are often many children in these areas.
This is why approximately one third of all the casualties are classified as children.
Because of their small size and lack of strength, fighting the rushing waters and
monstrous waves was extremely difficult for children. A surprising statistic is that about
10,000 tourists are included in the casualty count. The majority of these people come
from Europe.

Some Outcomes

Because the tsunami was the worst ever recorded in history, there was much humanitarian
aid given from the developed world to all the affect areas. There were major negative
impacts on sorts of infrastructure components including food and water shortages, and
economic infrastructure damage. Fortunately, as they should, many nations throughout
the globe donated large portions of funding to the affected areas. Countries including
Australia, Germany, Japan, Canada, and the U.S. donated 820, 660, 500 343, and 350
million U.S. dollars respectively.