This is an interesting scientific observation and I thought it might be nice to keep a record of it. I tried to work a radio angle into this post but I failed! 😂
At 04:10 UTC on the 15th of January 2022, a huge underwater volcano near Tonga in the Pacific exploded and sent a shock wave around the world. It was so big that the sound was heard as a rumble 9000kms away in Alaska.
The video clip above shows the explosion and you can see the shock wave being sent outwards.
What I find really amazing is that this pressure wave was detected at the other side of the planet in Europe.
Cormac, EI4HQ and Alan, EI3EBB both have their own weather stations and are located near the city of Cork on the south coast of Ireland.
At roughly 18:44 to 18:50 UTC, both Cormac and Alan detected the change in pressure on their weather stations.
EI4HQ in Cobh...
When I made the above image, I wasn't sure if it was the Tonga event or not. It later turned out that it was.
EI3EBB in Watergrasshill observed the same spike..
You'll notice that there is also a drop in pressure as the pressure wave passes.
Due to the shortcomings and distortion on the Mercator flat map, the pressure waves from Tonga actually came from the north-west and not from the south-west as the map might suggest.
It was interesting to see that the pressure wave arrived in Cork about 15 minutes or so before it reached weather stations in Essex and Suffolk in the south-east of England.
Short Path & Long Path... Just like in radio, there are two paths for a signal to travel on a globe. The short path is shown above and the long path as shown below.
And sure enough just before 02:00 UTC, the long path pressure wave arrived in Cork.
The distance for the long path signal was in the region of 24,000 kms.
It's amazing to think that a volcano in the Pacific could cause a change in air pressure at the other side of the planet.
Questions... Like any unusual event, it often raises more questions...
Q. Could the sudden change in air pressure cause a rain shower somewhere in Europe? Was the change enough?
Addendum... This is a more detailed chart from EI4HQ showing the air pressure changes...
