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Why Tonga eruption was so big and what's next
Fox News
People around the world looked on in awe at the spectacular satellite images of an undersea volcano erupting in a giant mushroom cloud in the Pacific.
The magma inside the volcano was under enormous pressure and had gasses trapped within it. A fracture in the rock likely induced a sudden drop in pressure, allowing the gas to expand and blast the magma apart. Cronin said the crater was sitting about 200 meters (650 feet) below the sea surface, a kind of Goldilocks depth for a big explosion in which seawater pours into the volcano and turns instantly into steam, adding to the rapid expansion and energy of the explosion. Any deeper and the extra pressure of the water would have helped contain the eruption.
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