5 Biggest Tsunami Waves in History

if there is one natural disaster i don't think anybody watching this video would want to experience it has to be a tsunami as we saw in 2004 and again in 2011 the amount of destruction caused by these events is far too great coastal cities that sat for decades untouched get washed away with little notice they are truly a terrifying force of nature however throughout history there have been a few tsunami waves that are so big it's almost hard to comprehend waves that were as tall as skyscrapers and destroyed everything in their path from the united

states to japan here are the five tallest tsunami waves in all of history now if you enjoy this video be sure to subscribe to underworld to see more just like it tsunamis are typically caused by massive underwater earthquakes as they displace large amounts of water believe it or not though there is another type of tsunami that has nothing to do with earthquakes or any other geological events this is called a mega tsunami and it occurs when a large amount of water displacement is caused by a sudden addition of material into a body of water most

of the time these mega tsunamis occur because of a sudden landslide or the collapse of an iceberg however one event in world history not only produced a mega tsunami but had an effect on the entire planet 66 million years ago an asteroid that was anywhere between 6.8 to 50.3 miles in diameter hit in the yucatan peninsula leaving behind what is known as the chiksulube impact crater it was a massive asteroid strike that produced a mega tsunami that was over 100 meters high and unlike anything that has ever been seen since it was so tall and

moved so fast that some scientists believe that the wave washed as far inland as chicago montana or even canada but in this case it wasn't the wave that did the most damage an asteroid strike on this scale was enough to wipe out entire species of animals from the planet even striking the water was like striking land regardless though it was enough to cause a massive environmental change all across the planet bringing about the ice age and likely the end of the dinosaurs japan is one of the most geologically active spots on planet earth located on

the border of three tectonic plates and situated within the infamous ring of fire the country is home to a number of active volcanoes among them is mount unzen an active volcanic group of several overlapping strata volcanoes near the city of shimabara nagasaki on the island of kyushu which is japan's southernmost main island it has been active as of 1990 when it awoke after a couple of hundred years then in 1991 an eruption caused a pyroclastic flow that killed 43 people however the fiery mountain is most well known for the destruction it caused in 1792 that

year the area had been recording a number of earthquakes when all of a sudden one of the lava domes collapsed into the ocean triggering a mega tsunami that took the lives of over 14 000 people and is still considered to be japan's worst volcanic related disaster one thing that made this tsunami especially deadly was the fact that it struck the hugo province on the other side of the aryake bay then it bounced back and hit shimabara again the wave was said to have reached a height of 330 feet or 100 meters making it capable of

reaching miles inland and wiping out anything in its path out of all of the fatalities around 5 000 are thought to have been from the landslide around 5000 from the tsunami going across the bay and the remainder from when the tsunami returned there are few geological events in recorded history that saw the destructive force as that of the mount saint helens eruption in 1980 it was the earth's largest terrestrial landslide in historical times a result of a restless volcano and its uniquely violent eruption the most defining thing of this eruption was the total collapse of

the northern slope leading to an immense pyroclastic flow however something else came out of this collapse that was disastrous in its own right when the side of the mountain fell it plowed directly into spirit lake which was a short distance from the base of the volcano as the huge column of rock and dirt crashed into the lake it produced a tsunami that measured 860 feet or 260 meters above the lake level the lake also grew in size nearly doubling from 1 300 acres to roughly 2 200 acres inland tsunamis like this are one of the

rarest natural disasters on earth this massive wall of water traveled for quite a ways knocking down trees and any structures that were in the way however even with 860 feet of water moving at an incredible rate it would eventually be overtaken by the fiery cloud of ash that spewed out of the mountain this mixture of water and ash created some of the most devastating mud flows clogging rivers and leaving a disgusting sludge behind that would take months to solidify over time spirit lake was able to fill back up and now has a level of around

3406 feet that is constantly monitored and maintained but it took over 20 years for the lake to get to the condition that it's currently in as you can see by the disaster of spirit lake inland tsunamis can spell certain doom for anyone unlucky enough to be in its path when it strikes however this wasn't the first inland tsunami to have been recorded just 17 years earlier in italy another inland tsunami did some serious damage in areas around a reservoir located about 100 kilometers north of venice just after world war ii italy decided to undertake a

number of construction projects including the building of genoa's fateful mirandi bridge which was a hydroelectric dam however prior to the dam's construction there were numerous warnings issued that the mountain above it monte talk was unstable as it was being built locals reported continual tremors and landslides however the operators ignored the danger signs they decided as a safety measure to lower the water level in the reservoir behind the dam it was a mistake that would cost them dearly on october 9 1963 a massive landslide sent rocks trees and earth plummeting into the reservoir below the impact

sent a huge wave of water shooting 250 meters above the dam just before sweeping down the valley below and destroying every village in its path the tsunami displaced the air with a force that was supposedly more powerful than an atomic bomb witness accounts were hard to come by though since most of the people in the line of impact died around 80 percent of them in a handful of villages along the valley floor some 350 families were wiped out altogether investigations later determined the landslide to be triggered by the lowering of the water level along with

heavy rainfall the immense weight of the water and earth could no longer be supported by the mountain it is hard to imagine tsunamis that are as tall as some of the ones we've already mentioned they're nearly as tall as football fields are long if not even bigger but that makes a person wonder is it possible for a tsunami to reach into the thousands of feet exactly how much force would it take for something like this to happen few people believe that it is even possible however the largest tsunami ever recorded would definitely put that question

to rest it happened in 1958 at latuya bay which is a quiet fjord in alaska on a calm and cool july night a massive tremor struck the area and triggered around 30.6 million cubic meters of rock to fall 3000 feet into the gilbert inlet causing a torrent of displaced water to shoot skyward and form a monstrous wave now when we say monstrous we mean that the wave was 1720 feet or roughly 520 meters high as it rushed through the fjord it removed all of the trees and vegetation along the slopes millions of trees were uprooted

and swept away by the wave miraculously though this wave only claimed five lives this is simply because it is an extremely sparsely populated area it proves just how deadly tsunamis can be when triggered by landslides this particular landslide was extremely dangerous not only because of how much land actually broke free but the height from which it did there has never been anything to even come close since then we've talked about how powerful tsunamis are plenty of times before but now we have a scale to be able to see exactly how big they can become whether

by earthquakes or landslides they remain some of the deadliest forces on the planet if you enjoyed this video and want to see another one just like it be sure to click the link on screen now with that thanks for watching and we'll see you in the next one