Suddenly, a volcanic island more than 60 kilometers away from the capital of Tonga suddenly erupted an "epic" eruption, and the pictures monitored by China's Fengyun satellite showed that this eruption formed an upward cloud with a diameter of about 500 kilometers, and the height of the cloud was about 20 kilometers, which had touched the stratosphere of the earth.
Volcanic earthquakes also caused the countries surrounding the sun to suffer from tsunami impact, in Asia, the japanese sea tsunami up to 30 cm, in China's coastal tsunami up to 20 cm, this tsunami is almost harmless, but some of Japan's docks have small fishing boats but sunk; the biggest impact of the tsunami is Tonga itself, because of the tsunami too close, the height of the tsunami is up to 1.5 meters, resulting in the back irrigation of seawater; on the west coast of the United States, there are also cities that have encountered seawater inversion.
It is estimated that this eruption is equivalent to 2,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs, or equivalent to a magnitude 8.7 earthquake, the atmospheric shock wave caused by the volcanic eruption instantaneously spreads rapidly into the distance, 2,000 kilometers away in New Zealand are affected, and a sound similar to an explosion is heard, (in fact, the shock wave disturbs the sound caused by the air currents in the local area), fortunately it occurred in the Pacific Ocean, if it happened on land, the earthquake alone will cause damage to many houses.
The eruption may have also cut off Tonga's submarine communication cables, making it difficult to get in touch with the outside world. No casualties have been reported at this time and it is estimated that there will not be many. The whole island has changed its appearance due to the eruption of the volcano, forming a huge opening, and volcanic ash and magma have reshaped the shape of the island and even increased the size of the island. However, the increase in area is of no use, and it is not suitable for living on such an island formed by an active volcano.
Some environmental experts also believe that the eruption may affect the global climate, because the ash was carried into the air about 20 kilometers, which has reached the stratosphere. The stratosphere is characterized by horizontal atmospheric flow, there is no such circulation movement near the surface, circulation movement can bring some volcanic ash back to the ground, while the volcanic ash in the stratosphere is more difficult to reach the ground, need to pass through the troposphere, if it encounters updraft, it is more hindered by the settlement of volcanic ash due to gravity.
This may reduce the sunlight radiation on the ground, dust is not as transparent as the atmosphere, it is directly absorbed by light energy, and can also reflect part of it, light can not pass through the ash. The reason why the troposphere is convected is because its heat is mainly infrared heating radiated after the surface is heated, so the farther away from the surface the lower the temperature, the thermal expansion and contraction, the settlement of the cold air mass, the rise of the hot air mass, the cooling and settlement after the rise, which forms a cyclic convective movement.
Mount Tambora
In 1815, Indonesia's Mount Tambora eruption caused global temperature to be affected, that eruption should be the strongest in the past two hundred years, tens of kilometers above the height of the cloud, the volcanic eruption spewed out 140 billion tons of magma, releasing energy equivalent to the power of the atomic bomb dropped by the United States on Hiroshima, Japan, at the end of World War II, killing 71,000 people. There were even summerless years in the higher latitudes of Europe and the United States, because more volcanic ash was imported into the stratosphere at that time, and China also recorded that unusual year.
In contrast, the eruption of The Tonga Volcano is very weak, according to experts, the energy released is equivalent to the level of 2,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs, while the eruption of Mount Tambora reached 50,000, which is about 25 times that of the Tonga eruption. If the intensity of the eruption is taken, it is not as strong as the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in 1991, which also had an impact on global temperatures, making temperatures 0.3-0.5 degrees lower than normal, but this cooling is not very deeply felt.
The eruption of Tambora Volcano has a volcanic eruption intensity of 7, which is the most intense volcanic eruption in the past two hundred years, while the eruption of Pinatubo Volcano in 1991 belongs to Level 6, and the intensity of this volcanic eruption in Tonga is about 5-6, although it causes some of the ash to enter the stratosphere, but the shielding effect on sunlight can not only look at the presence of volcanic ash, but the scale of volcanic ash. This eruption may have a certain impact, but it should not be compared to the two super eruptions mentioned above, and it will not cause a summerless year.
In fact, in recent years, global temperatures have repeatedly reached new highs, breaking records year by year, the trend of global warming is still increasing, and volcanic eruptions may also have certain benefits if they can bring a little temperature reduction. For the entire earth, the atmosphere, sea temperature rise of 1 °C will have a very serious impact, to know that since the Industrial Revolution, the global average temperature has only risen by about 1.1 °C, which led to an increase in global extreme weather events, sea level rise also led to some small Pacific island countries facing crisis.
The intensity of this eruption can only be seen from the satellite cloud map, only to see the rapid protrusion of the sea surface to form a huge upward rush cloud, which looks very large at the height of the satellite orbit. An inadvertent cough on earth can be a senseless disaster for human beings, and this disaster is still unpredictable. Volcanic eruptions are actually caused by underground geological movements, which must be accompanied by earthquakes, earthquakes cannot be predicted, and volcanic eruptions are difficult to predict.