Whangapoua Tsunami Deposits

New Zealand is on a steep learning curve about it's status as a seismically active area, and potentially the least discussed issue is Tsunami, maybe because there have been no large Tsunami recorded since the arrival of Pakeha.

Not to be confused with Whangapoua in the Coromandel Peninsula, this Whangapoua on Great Barrier Island is also east facing, therefore at risk from Tsunami resulting from activity in the Hikurangi Subduction Zone. Geological and Nuclear Sciences have conducted studies around an unusual collection of pebbles and shells here in the sand dunes and found that their origins are the seabed, some five kilometres away. The present estimate of the timeframe for the related Tsunami event is about 600 years ago.

The sand dunes are 14m high in parts and these deposits are scattered throughout, this should give coastal Kiwis some food for thought as to how high Tsunami waves might be and how far they might travel. There is other evidence under examination throughout New Zealand, and some reference in Maori oral tradition, about powerful tidal waves that have transformed coastal communities in the past.

How to get here is to walk south in the dunes from Whangapoua. There are also haangi pits and middens from early Maori days on Great Barrier - Aotea.