Fact Check: Did a US nuclear test cause the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami?
JAKARTA, INDONESIA: A claim has been circulating on social media suggesting that the devastating 2004 tsunami that wrecked the Indian Ocean was not caused by a natural earthquake, but because of a secret US nuclear test conducted under the sea. The claim has sparked speculations online about its authenticity. Let us fact-check the claim.
Claim: The 2004 Tsunami was caused by a US nuclear test
Earlier this month, a narrative claiming the 2004 Aceh earthquake and tsunami were because of a nuclear test operation by the United States military circulated on Threads, Facebook, and TikTok.
According to the narrative, the information was contained in declassified CIA FOIA documents F-2013-00698 and F-2017-00427 concerning a secret operation called Operation Tidal Wave, which allegedly revealed the underwater nuclear test series in the Indian Ocean from 2004 to 2005.
The content justified the claim by citing the presence of the United States aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln at the disaster site.
They also linked oil and gas exploitation activities by the American company Exxonmobil in Aceh after the disaster as a pretext for the economic interests behind the tragedy.
Fact Check: Tsunami was caused by an earthquake
Based on confirmed information from credible sources, the claims made were false.
According to studies and geological evidence, the 2004 tsunami was caused by a 9.2 magnitude earthquake centered in the Indian Ocean, approximately 250 km from the west coast of Aceh.
The earthquake occurred due to the shifting of two tectonic plates in the Indian Ocean, which caused a thrust fault. The fault is 500 kilometers long, or roughly the distance from Jakarta to Yogyakarta, and approximately 150 kilometers wide.
Plate displacement along this fault reached more than 20 meters, generating tremendous energy that triggered tsunami waves as high as 35 meters, equivalent to the height of a 10-story building.
The Chairperson of the Indonesian Association of Disaster Experts (IABI), Prof. Harkunti P. Rahayu, stated that the 2004 earthquake and tsunami were a natural disaster.
"The rupture was visible from satellites and direct observations at sea," Harkunti told the news outlet Tempo on Sunday, January 11.
The devastating tsunami of 2004
On 26 December 2004, an earthquake struck the epicenter off the west coast of Aceh, in northern Sumatra, Indonesia.
The earthquake caused a massive tsunami with waves up to 30 m high, commonly referred to as the Boxing Day tsunami, after the Boxing Day holiday, or the Asian tsunami, which devastated communities along the surrounding coasts of the Indian Ocean.
The tragedy led to the killing of an estimated 227,898 people in 14 countries, especially in Aceh (Indonesia), Sri Lanka, Tamil Nadu in India, and Khao Lak in Thailand.
