Jackson James Rice, an 18-year-old who was set to become the first Caucasian to represent Tonga in the Olympics, died over the weekend in a tragic diving accident mere weeks before the Summer Games.
An underwater earthquake hit near Tonga on Friday and officials recorded its magnitude as 7.3.
The South Pacific island nation of Tonga entered a Chinese coronavirus lockdown on Wednesday expected to last at least 48 hours after health officials in the remote kingdom detected Tonga’s first-ever community transmission of the disease on Tuesday in two port workers, Reuters reported.
A Tongan journalist said the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano on Saturday was so powerful that many residents were deafened and had to use hand gestures to communicate while evacuating.
A Peruvian oil tanker spilled much of its contents into the waters of the Pacific Ocean on Saturday affecting at least two miles of Peru’s central coast after waves sparked by Tonga’s volcanic eruption and tsunami that day in the South Pacific rocked the actively discharging ship, Peruvian government officials said Monday.
A volcanic eruption and tsunami in the South Pacific island kingdom of Tonga on Saturday caused massive waves which radiated throughout the greater Pacific Ocean in subsequent hours, reaching the coasts of Peru — where two people died after a tsunami engulfed a beach in the country’s north — and Chile.
The National and Pacific Tsunami Warning Centers have issued tsunami advisories for the entire West Coast, Hawaii, and parts of Alaska as a volcano erupted near Tonga late Friday.
China’s state-run Global Times published a vocal defense of the nation’s “One Belt, One Road” infrastructure plan on Tuesday, insisting the predatory loans it offers to developing nations come “with no political strings attached” and that those who warn China is attempting to colonize poorer countries have their own “ulterior motives.”
