April 4, 1906 Tsunami: Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy
A tsunami caused by a volcano began at Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy on April 4, 1906. The water rose as high as 0.4 meters. It killed 350 people, counting the earthquake or eruption that caused it.
Where the waves reached
The source of the tsunami. No runup with a place is recorded for it.
- Under 1 m
- 1 to 3 m
- 3 to 10 m
- 10 to 30 m
- 30 m and more
- Height not recorded
Travel times
How long the first wave took to reach each part of the ocean, one line for each hour up to 24, estimated from the source and the depth of the sea.
The travel times are computed in your browser, which needs JavaScript.
- 1 to 4 hours
- 5 to 6 hours
- 7 to 14 hours
- 15 hours and more
Computed in your browser the way NOAA’s own travel time maps are: the wave travels at the square root of gravity times the depth, over NOAA’s ETOPO1 depths averaged to a 10 arc-minute grid. Checked against NOAA NCEI’s maps for 21 tsunamis over the first 24 hours, these lines fall within 10 minutes of NCEI’s at half the points compared and within 52 minutes at 9 in 10. They give when the first wave could arrive, not how high it is; bays, harbors and island chains finer than the grid can see it later. Not for use in a warning: see tsunami.gov.
The tsunami
- Date
- April 4, 1906
- Source
- Tyrrhenian Sea, Italy
- Cause
- Volcano
- Volcano
- The eruption that caused it
- Maximum water height
- 0.4 m (1.3 ft)
- Runups recorded
- 0
- Tsunami intensity (Soloviev-Imamura)
- 3
- Waters
- Ocean
- How certain
- Definite tsunami
- Source location
- 40.821° N, 14.426° E
The toll
- Deaths
- 350 with the earthquake or eruption that caused it
- Injuries
- 300 with the earthquake or eruption that caused it
Where the literature gives no number, NCEI records a description on a scale of 1 to 4, printed here in its words. Damage is in millions of US dollars of the year of the event, not adjusted for inflation.
What the record says
NCEI’s account, from the sources it cites.
1906, April 4. Tyrrhenian Sea, Bay of Naples. The level of the sea near Naples and in Portico, in Vico Equense and in the Island of Ischia oscillated with an average amplitude of 40 cm, i = 3 during the eruption of Vesuvius. (reference #2130)
Reliability = 4 (definite tsunami). Sieberg-Ambraseys scale (Ambraseys, 1962) 2= light. In the Gulf of Naples during the eruption, the sea level changed with an amplitude of 40 cm between Vico Equense and Portici (Mercalli, 1906b). Some fishermen referred that at the place called Scoglio Lungo (near the Favorita), during the eruption they noted that the sea withdrew and that some rocks, usually submerged, appeared. A similar phenomenon also occurred near S.Giovanni (Mercalli, 1906b). (reference #11164)
More
Every tsunami in 1906The 1900sTsunamis of ItalyThe eruptionThis day in weather historyAlerts in force
Sources
Tsunami events and runups from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, Global Historical Hazard Database, cited as NCEI/WDS, doi:10.7289/V5PN93H7. Public domain. Read 2026-09-24. NCEI tsunami event 3413.