The eruption of the Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai volcano had the entire West Coast of the United States under a tsunami warning for most of Saturday. But the volcano’s effect on the Seattle area manifested in a different, more peculiar way.
The volcano’s eruption sent thick plumes of ash and smoke into the skies above the Pacific Ocean. What it also did was send an 820-mile-an-hour shockwave straight toward the United States, which was then detected by the University of Washington’s atmospheric sciences department. It’s estimated that the shockwave covered over 5,700 miles in a matter of hours before arriving in the Seattle area.
For the early hours of
→ Continue reading at MyNorthwest