What Happened to Tonga?

Tonga’s kingdom is nearly cut off from the rest of the world due to the globe’s largest volcanic eruption in decades. From Southern California to Japan and Peru, millions of accounts describing the eruption’s effects were found all throughout the world. Only 40 miles from the volcano site, concerns for the nation of Tonga and its 100,000 people grew as nothing was heard from Tonga. The underwater internet cables connecting Tonga to the rest of the world had been severed, cutting them off from the rest of the world.

 

“Imagine having your home destroyed, everything you know gone, and the ocean filled with ash and then on top of that you cant use the internet, I cant begging to fathom how they feel, ” says Ayan D., a  junior at AISG.

According to reports released on the 16th of January, the land is covered in debris, and the nearby waters have been poisoned by volcanic ash. Tonga, a nation made up of islands, had an even more difficult time regrouping its people due to the water in between the islands. Tonga’s government dispatched numerous boats to the Ha’apai group, which had been the hardest hit by the eruption. The islands of Mango, Fonoifua, and Nomuka were damaged, and the islands are being evacuated.

“I can imagine how worried families are they cant even contact their parents!” says Jacky C. a freshman at AISG.

Scientists had never witnessed anything like the shockwave caused by the volcano’s eruption. The wave reached a height of almost 96 kilometers, far above the stratosphere, and traveled around the earth at a speed of more than 965 kilometers per hour.

 

The destruction wreaked by the eruption has erupted as stories all over the internet. The story of Lisala Folau, who was swept away by the tsunami generated by the eruption, is one of the stories that everyone is talking about. He’d been drifting between Tonga’s islands for 12 hours without a boat, food, or water.