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Lisbon Earthquake (Portugal)
Magnitude: ~M9
Death Toll: 20,000
Facts: Produced waves as high as 20 meters that swept along the coast of North Africa, and struck Martinque and Barbados across the Atlantic Ocean. -
Krakatoa Eruption (Java/Sumatra)
Magnitude: VEI 6
Death Toll: 36,000
Facts: One eruption on August 27 was heard 2800 miles away. It caused fiery red sunsets around the world up to three years afterwards. -
Aleutian Earthquake (Alaska)
Magnitude:M8.1
Death Toll: 160
Facts: The wave reached Kauai, Hawaii 4.5 hours after the quake, and Hilo, Hawaii 4.9 hours later. -
Great Chilean Earthquake (Chile)
Magnitude: M9.5
Death Toll: 61
Facts: It was caused due to the subduction of Nazca plate under the South American plate. Waves set off it by bounced back and forth across the pacific for a week. -
Good Friday Earthquake (Alaska)
Magnitude: M9.2
Death Toll: 130
Facts: In Chenega, 25 of the village's 76 residents drowned in a tsunami. The only building that survived the wave intact was the schoolhouse. -
Hokkaido Earthquake (Japan)
Magnitude: M7.8
Death Toll: 120
Facts: It took between two to seven minutes after the earthquake for the first of the destructive tsunami waves to strike the coastlines of Okushiri Island. -
Papua New Guinea Earthquake (Papua New Guinea)
Magnitude: M7.1
Death Toll: 2100
Facts: The villages on the slender spit of land which separates the Sissano lagoon from the sea completely disappeared. -
Sumatra Earthquake (Indonesia)
Magnitude: M9.1
Death Toll: 230,000
Facts: The rupture was more than 600 miles long, displacing the seafloor by 10 yards horizontally and several yeards vertically. -
Samoa Earthquake (Samoan Islands)
Magnitude: M8.1
Death Toll: 200
Facts: It was caused by at least two separate earthquakes occurring within 2-3 minutes of each other near the Tonga Trench. -
Chile Earthquake (Chile)
Magnitude: M8.8
Death Toll: 700
Facts: Thrust faulting by the South American Plate as it overrides the Nazca Plate created the megathrust earthquake. -
Tohoku Earthquake (Japan)
Magnitude: M9.1
Death Toll: 20,000
Facts: People in Japan felt strong shaking for three to five minutes. -
Sulawesi Earthquake (Indonesia)
Magnitude: M7.5
Death Toll: 105
Facts: Aftershocks continued in central Sulawesi into November, with a magnitude 5 quake occurring on Nov. 3