Earth & Environment
How the Hunga Tonga Eruption Cooled the Stratosphere and Rewrote Volcanic Rules
The 2022 Hunga Tonga eruption uniquely cooled the stratosphere, a departure from typical warming effects of major volcanoes, driven by an unprecedented injection of water vapor from its submarine location. This fundamentally altered our understanding of volcanic climate impacts.
David Grossman·May 20, 2026
