§1- People in many countries are recovering from the effects of a powerful earthquake Sunday in the Indian Ocean (caused by a rupture between the Eurasian and Australian plates). The underwater earthquake created waves that struck coastal from Indonesia to Somalia. The earthquake caused a series of huge, destructive ocean waves, also called a tsunami.
§2- In the Japanese language, the word tsunami means “ wave.” Earthquakes are a major cause of tsunamis. But landslides on the ocean also can cause huge ocean waves. Other causes are exploding volcanoes and even explosions.
§3- Experts say a tsunami can as fast as seven hundred twenty-five kilometres an hour. And, the waves can be more than metres high as they move toward land.
§4- Tsunamis can form near the centre of an earthquake and travel in all directions. This means they can affect countries of kilometres from each other.
§5- Tsunamis are most common in the Pacific Ocean. Japan has had the most tsunamis. In the hundreds of years, one hundred thousand people have been killed by tsunamis in Japan. Six years ago, more than two thousand people died when a tsunami Papua New Guinea.
§6- American scientists say the earthquake in the Indian Ocean Sunday nine-point-zero on the Richter system of earthquake measurement. They say it also was the strongest earthquake measured since nineteen-hundred.

from VOA Special English