

Atmospheric waves form in the sky at the boundary between air masses of different densities.The giant wave in Lituya Bay that was described in the introduction to this chapter was a splash wave. Splash waves are formed when something falls into the ocean and creates a splash.They are also called seismic sea waves ( section 10.4). Tsunamis are large waves created as a result of earthquakes or other seismic disturbances.Tidal waves are not related to tsunamis, so don’t confuse the two. What we think of as tides are basically enormously long waves with a wavelength that may span half the globe (see section 11.1).

