Pauline Vaiangina, her husband and their four young children, who live in Tongatapu, the main island of Tonga, were visiting their grandmother on the tiny remote island, when Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai broke out.
Sudden Explosions
“It was a Saturday like any other,” said Pauline. We had just finished fish for dinner and I was washing the dishes when the dogs barked non-stop as if trying to warn us of something… they persisted. ”
Suddenly they heard explosions from the volcano so loud and intense that they could be heard and felt over 800 kilometers away in Fiji.
After the second, larger explosion, Pauline noticed an incredible change in the movement of the tides. “It goes out and back in. Each time the tide recedes, the beach gets drier and drier, and the sea level rises higher.
© UNICEF / Malani Wolfgramm
A destroyed house in the village of Kolomotu’a on Tonga’s main island of Tongatapu, seven days after the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai underwater volcano and the tsunami in Tonga.
‘Run up the mountain!’
That’s when I yelled, ‘Run up the mountain!’ We shouted for all the neighbors to flee to the high ground – the waves and the volcano were too loud.”
As Pauline had predicted, a tsunami was about to hit Mango Island. Like volcanoes, the tsunami’s effects spread beyond Tonga, with effects being felt as far away as Peru and California in the United States.
Pauline’s husband carried all four of their children up the mountain, returning to carry their 80-year-old grandmother.
As they sat under the coconut tree, watching the ash and stones fall from the sky, and the great waves crash on the island, almost every structure was destroyed, leaving the people homeless.
Singing chant.
Covered only by tarps and small mats, all of Pauline’s followers and her family up the mountain huddled together through the night and sang hymns as the volcano roared; Lightning lit up the whole sky.
“We didn’t leave the mountain until Monday morning,” recalls Pauline. “We arrived at an island that had been completely wiped out. We swim in the sea, looking for leftover clothes. At this point, we are just grateful to be alive.”
© UNICEF / Malani Wolfgramm
A family dries furniture outside their house after it was damaged in the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai underwater volcano and the tsunami.
