Series · Climate & Perils
Tsunamis
Every recorded tsunami from antiquity to the present, with 35,000 site-level wave measurements: what generates them, where they strike, and the events that remade global early warning.
3 episodes
- Source
- NOAA/NCEI Global Historical Tsunami Database
- Coverage
- 2000 BCE to 2026, global
- Catalogue
- 1,104 definite events
- Peril type
- Geophysical (mostly seismically triggered)
- Updated
- 2026
Record context · experienced risk
New episode: The Long Wave
5 Jul 2026
Episodes
Every definite tsunami source mapped across two millennia, sized by the water it raised and coloured by what caused it: earthquakes mostly, volcanoes and landslides for the rest.
The full catalogue: year, source, cause, earthquake magnitude, maximum water height, runup count and toll for every recorded tsunami.
The deadliest tsunami in history. A magnitude 9.1 Sumatran megathrust sent waves up to 50.9 metres ashore and killed around 227,899 people in 14 countries with no warning system between them.