The research shows that the tsunami was taller than the December 2004 tsunami triggered by the undersea earthquake off Indonesia. That tsunami reached a height of 108 feet and claimed an estimated 230,210 lives in Indonesia, Thailand, Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka.
In comparison, around 25,000 died in the Great East Japan Earthquake.
Though the tsunami was the largest since May 1980, when part of Mount St Helens, in Washington State, collapsed in the course of a volcanic eruption. That landslide surged into nearby Spirit Lake, triggering a megatsunami some 853 feet high.
The largest tsunami recorded to date was the Lituya Bay megatsunami, which occurred on July 9, 1958, when a landslide caused more than 1 trillion cubic feet of rock and ice to fall into the narrow Alaskan inlet of Lituya Bay. The resulting tsunami was measured at 1,720 feet, 470 feet higher than the roof of the Empire State Building.
