In an evacuation centre on Nukuʻalofa, Marian Kupu listened as a mother described the moment a tsunami forced her to flee with her daughter to the hills above Nomuka, in the Ha'apai region of Tonga.
"Her 10-year-old daughter got up and ran towards higher ground. She had never seen her daughter show so much fear," Ms Kupu said.
"She was running in front of her mum, shouting 'mum, run for your life.'
"The way the mother explained it, it was devastating."
The pair were separated during their escape. But after a short search, Ms Kupu said the woman eventually found her daughter kneeling beside a fallen coconut tree.
The young girl was so distressed by the experience that she stopped talking for several days.
"At that age, you couldn't imagine the feeling, [the thoughts] and the experience they had," she said.
While everyone suffers during natural disasters, women and girls experience unique risks.
According to the UN, about 70 per cent of women and girls have experienced sexual or gender-based violence during crises.
But despite this, women and girls are proving to be capable leaders, promoting women's needs in disaster preparedness, response, and recovery.
A one-in-1,000-year eruption
Ms Kupu, a journalist with more than a decade's experience in the region, was enjoying a quiet Saturday afternoon like many Tongans when loud bangs rang out across the South Pacific nation.
Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai erupted in the early hours of the evening, sending shockwaves around the world — the sounds so loud they were heard in Fiji, Vanuatu, Alaska and Canada.
The 1-in-1,000-year volcanic eruption propelled ash and rock into skies above Tonga's largest island, Tongatapu, before a tsunami inundated low-lying areas.
"The clouds, the noise, the ash was coming and there was a distinctive smell," she said.
"I knew it was the volcano erupting, but we didn't know what was going to happen."
Tongan writer and consultant Sia Uhila Angilau sensed the scale of the eruption — the mounting pressure in her ears felt as if they were "going to burst"
Fear and panic
Ms Angilau said panicked locals spilled out onto the street, causing congestion and chaos.
"People were crying and running and calling out.
"I was in a car and I wished I was in a truck so I could take all the people on the road," she said.
"Most people didn't know where they were running to, they were just going away from the ocean."
Five people died, including two swimmers in Peru, and up to 600 buildings were damaged or destroyed by the tsunami, which wiped out some islands completely.
Ms Angilau said the events of January 15 were still raw for many people.
"The fear, the panic and everything, I think we're still reliving that reality now," she said.
Eruption, tsunami, COVID-19 exacerbates violence against women
A full recovery is expected to take years. For women and girls, ongoing disruptions to family units, health systems and housing can be particularly distressing, and lead to violence.
Ofa Guttenbeil-Likiliki is the director of the Women and Children Crisis Centre (WCCC) in Tonga.
In the first 72 hours after the eruption and tsunami, the WCCC carried out needs assessments and worked to ensure women and children had shelter, food and water and emotional support.
"So, making sure they were in places with good lighting, access to bathrooms, and they weren't in positions of being abused or violated because of their vulnerabilities," she said.
"Then we rolled out psychosocial support to these affected areas, and in particular, the women who were displaced from outer islands.
Many women were already escaping violence which worsened during recent COVID-19 lockdowns.
The WCCC handles between 20 and 30 domestic and family violence cases each month, but after Tonga's 26-day lockdown in early February, Ms Guttenbeil-Likiliki said that rose by an additional 55 cases.
An inclusive, local disaster response
While women bear the brunt of trauma during disasters, they are leaders in recovery and resilience.
Sharon Bhagwan-Rolls is the Regional Manager of Shifting the Power Coalition, which draws upon the skills, cultural knowledge and lived experiences of Pacific Island women to respond to disasters.
"We're progressing gender equality, disability and LGBT inclusion agenda, because as local women leaders, we are on the front lines, and we've been experiencing it," she said.
Ms Bhagwan-Rolls said it was often the case that the humanitarian response to natural disasters in the Pacific was led by people outside the region and failed to meet the needs of diverse groups.
Selling coconuts, loaning out boats
In the days and weeks after Tonga Hunga-Tonga Ha'apai erupted, Ms Angilau said women did "everything they could" to help their communities get back on their feet.
"A lady was telling me how she couldn't go to work during the lockdowns, so she went and collected coconuts, and sold them by the roadside just to make money," she said.
"I'm aware of another woman who went and took out a loan so her boat could be used by the divers to go fishing, just to earn money and have food available for us after the eruption.
