Interesting -geophysicists with the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization are saying this recent eruption produced the largest shock waves that they have ever seen:
A nuclear-test monitor calls Tonga volcano blast 'biggest thing that we've ever seen'The explosive volcanic eruption in Tonga on Saturday appears to dwarf the largest nuclear detonations ever conducted, according to a global group that monitors for atomic testing.
The shock wave from the blast was so powerful that it was detected as far away as Antarctica, says Ronan Le Bras, a geophysicist with the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization in Vienna, Austria, which oversees an international network of remote monitoring stations.
In total, 53 detectors around planet Earth heard the low-frequency boom from the explosion as it traveled through the atmosphere. It was the loudest event the network had detected in more than 20 years of operation, according to Le Bras.
"Every single station picked it up," he says. "It's the biggest thing that we've ever seen."
According to Le Bras, atmospheric measurements in Austria, roughly 10,000 miles from the eruption site, detected a shock wave that was 2 hectopascals in strength. By comparison, the largest nuclear weapon ever tested, the Soviet Union's Tsar Bomba, generated a shock wave of just 0.5-0.7 hectopascals in New Zealand, which sits at a comparable distance from Russia's nuclear test site in Novaya Zemlya.
Similar readings were picked up in other parts of Europe.
