Tsunamis, although rare, can be extremely dangerous. Over the last 100 years, 58 tsunamis have killed almost 300,000 people, which is roughly 4,600 per disaster. This surpasses any other natural disaster. The most lives claimed in a single period Tsunami occured in the Indian Ocean, this disaster claimed an estimate of almost 300,000 lives with Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand suffering the most.

Only three weeks following this tragedy, the global community came together in Japan and adopted the 10-year Hyogo Framework for Action, the first international agreement on disaster reduction. Around this time, they also initiated the Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning and Mitigation System, which aims to boast sea-level monitoring stations and alerts to national tsunami information centres. Exponential growth in tourism and urbanization in tsunami-prone regions put people in harm’s way. That makes the reduction of risk an extremely important factor in global efforts to reach the 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

The UN General Assembly declared November 5 as World Tsunami Awareness Day. The day was chosen to honor an old Japanese tale about an 1854 earthquake. During the earthquake, a farmer saw the tide receding and he set fire to his harvest to warn villagers and they made their way to higher ground. After this, he built planted trees as a form of shielding against future waves. The United Nations General Assembly urges all nations, international bodies, and civil society to honor the day and raise awareness about tsunamis, and ways countries  can protect themselves.