On January 15th, 2022, social media and news reports emerged of booming and explosion noises throughout Aotearoa, caused by atmospheric pressure waves from the eruption of Hunga volcano, Tonga. Instrumental records from tidal gauges, DART buoys, meteorological stations and post-event damage surveys are being used to shape our understanding of the physical processes associated with the eruption and associated tsunami, such as pressure changes, acoustic signals and wave arrival times. To develop a more holistic understanding of this complex event and how it was experienced by or impacted communities, we designed a survey to capture insights and promote public engagement with science. We sought to understand the spatial and temporal distribution of sound and tsunami observations using crowdsourced geospatial data, allowing the public to participate and report experiences. An interdisciplinary team of social, volcano, and tsunami scientists from GNS Science deployed this survey online between January 21st and February 13th, 2022. Thirty-nine questions were posed to the public, asking about location, time, water colour, smells, damage to the built/natural environments and number of surges/booms observed. Respondents provided images and videos displaying impacted coastlines, flooded campgrounds, coastal erosion, unusual currents, and audio of booms. From this case study, we identify key lessons to improve crowdsourced data collection approaches for future hazardous events. These key lessons include using appropriate data collection methods to facilitate the intended use of the data, considering the ethical implications of collecting and sharing the data, and the technical requirements for sharing the data with various audiences.