Bathymetry off north coast of New Guinea

The bathymetry indicates that just offshore of the northern coast of New Guinea there is very steep and linear slope. It is possible that the relatively deep water near shore contributed to the unusual height of the 1998 Papua New Guinea tsunami. Shown here is the bathymetry in the region contoured at 200 m intervals from the 2-minute bathymetric data of Smith and Sandwell (1997).

In this figure, black circles indicate locations for the earthquake determined by the NEIC, Harvard, and the Earthquake Research Institute (ERI) at the University of Tokyo.