Ocean surface gravity waves excited by the 2022 eruption of Hunga
Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai Volcano
Abstract
On 15 January 2022, a massive underwater eruption occurred at the Hunga
Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai Volcano. The plume reached the mesosphere, and the
eruption excited a significant atmospheric Lamb wave, which forced the
tsunami. The complicated tsunami waveforms due to ocean-atmosphere
coupling prevented inferring the force history of the excitation. To
address this, we analyze ocean surface gravity waves (OSWs) from 15 to
40 mHz, which are decoupled from the Lamb wave due to their slower phase
velocities. Modeling these OSWs, we infer that the excitation started at
4:00 UTC with an amplitude of 1010 N and lasted for 5 hours, followed by
a sub-event at 8:40 UTC. The observations suggest an initial blowout of
seawater above the summit and a subsequent outflow that excited a
tsunami below 5 mHz. The 2-hour delayed OSW excitation from 6 to 15 mHz
may indicate seawater inflow into the crater.