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Data

Number of tsunamis

NOAA/NCEI
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Natural Disasters

What you should know about this indicator

Tsunamis are only included if they were classified in the Global Historical Tsunami Database as "probable" or "definite".

Source
National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service (2024) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Last updated
May 9, 2024
Next expected update
May 2025
Date range
1610 BCE – 2023 CE
Unit
events

Sources and processing

This data is based on the following sources

The Global Historical Tsunami Database provides information on over 2,400 tsunamis from 2100 BC to the present in the the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans; and the Mediterranean and Caribbean Seas. The database provides information on the tsunami source such as the date, time, and location of the source event; cause and validity of the source, tsunami magnitude and intensity; maximum water height; the total number of fatalities, injuries, houses destroyed, and houses damaged; total damage estimate (in U.S. dollars). The database also provides information on the runups (the locations where tsunami waves were observed by eyewitnesses, reconnaissance surveys, tide gauges, and deep-ocean sensors) such as name, location, arrival time, maximum water height and inundation distance, and socio-economic data (deaths, injuries, damage) for the specific runup location.

Retrieved on
May 9, 2024
Retrieved from
http://dx.doi.org/10.7289/V5PN93H7
Citation
This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data. To cite data downloaded from this page, please use the suggested citation given in Reuse This Work below.
National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service: NCEI/WDS Global Historical Tsunami Database. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information. doi:10.7289/V5PN93H7
The data can be accessed via the NCEI/WDS Global Historical Tsunami Database or via the Natural Hazards API.

How we process data at Our World in Data

All data and visualizations on Our World in Data rely on data sourced from one or several original data providers. Preparing this original data involves several processing steps. Depending on the data, this can include standardizing country names and world region definitions, converting units, calculating derived indicators such as per capita measures, as well as adding or adapting metadata such as the name or the description given to an indicator.

At the link below you can find a detailed description of the structure of our data pipeline, including links to all the code used to prepare data across Our World in Data.

Read about our data pipeline

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  • All data produced by third-party providers and made available by Our World in Data are subject to the license terms from the original providers. Our work would not be possible without the data providers we rely on, so we ask you to always cite them appropriately (see below). This is crucial to allow data providers to continue doing their work, enhancing, maintaining and updating valuable data.
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Citations

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Number of tsunamis”, part of the following publication: Hannah Ritchie and Pablo Rosado (2022) - “Natural Disasters”. Data adapted from National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service. Retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-tsunamis [online resource]
How to cite this data

In-line citationIf you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service (2024) – with major processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service (2024) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Number of tsunamis – NOAA/NCEI” [dataset]. National Geophysical Data Center / World Data Service, “Global Historical Tsunami Database” [original data]. Retrieved July 26, 2024 from https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-tsunamis