[redhead]

"That's interesting! 3-4 foot waves are common on the ocean, so I would never have suspected that the tsunami that caused this much devastation would have a wave height that small. I was envisioning these 50 feet walls of water...."

It's not the height of the wave, it's the velocity. They travel at incredible speeds.

[Nov3]

They travel at incredible speeds.

In the open ocean. Close to shore they slow down and pile up into huge waves. They are still traveling plenty fast just not 500 miles per hour.

[gortklattu]

The other thing I have noticed about these waves is the incredible mass of water that is involved in the tesunami. It's not just some "wave". What we're seeing here is the front of a hydraulic jump with incredible force and speed.

Those multiple waves involve an increase in height like a staircase. That's why the total increase in the water level was over five meters.

[holyscroller]

This is a dumb question, but if you were out in the open ocean as it came by, and you were in the water beside your boat, would it carry you 500 miles from your boat, take the boat 500 miles too, or just drown you and sink the boat?