The eastern Indian ocean earthquake and tsunami : first seafloor survey by Royal Navy's HMS Scott

The earthquake offshore Sumatra, Indonesia and the Nicobar-Andaman Islands, India on 26th December 2004 (Figure 1) was the second largest earthquake ever recorded (in 50-60 years recording history) with a moment magnitude of 9.3. The resulting tsunami wave propagated across the Indian Ocean causing devastation in coastal south-east Asia, Sri Lanka, India and East Africa and the loss of an estimated 300,000 lives. First post-disaster seafloor survey of the area was recently completed.