6.6 magnitude earthquake strikes near Samoa: Tremor's epicentre deep below Pacific; No tsunami threat, says USGS
The seismic event was recorded at 12:37 pm (2337 GMT Thursday), occurring 314 kilometres (195 miles) below the surface and over 400 kilometres from Samoa's southwestern coastline, as reported by AFP, quoting USGS.
The US tsunami warning agency stated there was "no tsunami threat".
The South Pacific region frequently experiences earthquakes due to its location along the seismic "Ring of Fire" - a zone of significant tectonic activity extending through Southeast Asia and across the Pacific basin.
Whilst these events rarely cause extensive damage in areas with low population density, they possess the potential to set off devastating landslides.
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Hindustan Times
3 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
Tsunami warnings fade after strongest earthquake in 14 years hits Russia's Kamchatka
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First Post
5 hours ago
- First Post
Millions return home as Tsunami warning lifted across the Pacific rim
After one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded rattled Russia's sparsely populated Far East, more than a dozen nations – from Japan to the United States to Ecuador – warned citizens to stay away from coastal regions. read more View of the waves in Vina del Mar, Chile on July 30, 2025. Chile warned on July 29, 2025, of a "high probability" of a tsunami in the country as a result of an 8.8 magnitude earthquake off the coast of Russia, the Navy reported. AFP Tsunami warnings were lifted across the Pacific rim Wednesday, allowing millions of temporary evacuees to return home. After one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded rattled Russia's sparsely populated Far East, more than a dozen nations – from Japan to the United States to Ecuador – warned citizens to stay away from coastal regions. Storm surges of up to four metres (12 feet) were predicted for some parts of the Pacific, after the 8.8 quake struck off Russia's Kamchatka peninsula. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD The tsunamis caused widespread disruption. Peru closed 65 of its 121 Pacific ports and authorities on Maui cancelled flights to and from the Hawaiian island. But fears of a catastrophe were not realised, with country after country lifting or downgrading warnings and telling coastal residents they could return. In Japan, almost two million people had been ordered to higher ground, before the warnings were downgraded or rescinded. The Fukushima nuclear plant in northeast Japan – destroyed by a huge quake and tsunami in 2011 – was temporarily evacuated. The only reported fatality was a woman killed while driving her car off a cliff in Japan as she tried to escape, local media reported. In Chile, authorities conducted what the Interior Ministry said was 'perhaps the most massive evacuation ever carried out in our country' – with 1.4 million people ordered to high ground. Chilean authorities reported no damage or victims and registered waves of just 60 centimeters (two feet) on the country's north coast. In the Galapagos Islands, where waves of up to three meters were expected, there was relief as the Ecuadoran navy's oceanographic institute said the danger had passed. Locals reported the sea level falling and then rising suddenly, a phenomenon which is commonly seen with the arrival of a tsunami. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD But only a surge of just over a meter was reported, causing no damage. 'Everything is calm, I'm going back to work. The restaurants are reopening and the places tourists visit are also open again,' said 38-year-old Santa Cruz resident Isabel Grijalva. Earlier national parks were closed, schools were shuttered, loudspeakers blared warnings and tourists were spirited off sightseeing boats and onto the safety of land. The worst damage was seen in Russia, where a tsunami crashed through the port of Severo-Kurilsk and submerged the local fishing plant, officials said. Russian state television footage showed buildings and debris swept into the sea. The surge of water reached as far as the town's World War II monument about 400 meters from the shoreline, said Mayor Alexander Ovsyannikov. The initial quake also caused limited damage and only light injuries, despite being the strongest since 2011, when 15,000 people were killed in Japan. Russian scientists reported that the Klyuchevskoy volcano erupted shortly after the earthquake. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'Red-hot lava is observed flowing down the western slope. There is a powerful glow above the volcano and explosions,' said Russia's Geophysical Survey. Pacific alerts Wednesday's quake was the strongest in the Kamchatka region since 1952, the regional seismic monitoring service said, warning of aftershocks of up to 7.5 magnitude. The US Geological Survey said the quake was one of the 10 strongest tremors recorded since 1900. It was followed by dozens of aftershocks that further shook the Russian Far East, including one of 6.9 magnitude. The USGS said there was a 59 percent chance of an aftershock of more than 7.0 magnitude in the next week.
Indian Express
6 hours ago
- Indian Express
Why 8.8 magnitude Kamchatka quake is rare but not unusual
An 8.8 magnitude earthquake, one of the strongest on record, struck the Kamchatka Peninsula, in Russia's far-east, about 6,500 km east of Moscow, on Wednesday morning, triggering a tsunami that struck several countries on both sides of the northern Pacific Ocean. The tsunami generated waves as high as 3-4 metres in the Kamchatka Peninsula and some other places, about five feet in Hawaii, and about two feet in Japan. Flooding and damage were reported from several places, but no lives were lost. The earthquake in Kamchatka was the strongest since the 9.1 magnitude quake that had struck Japan in 2011. That quake too had caused a major tsunami which then led to the nuclear disaster at Fukushima. Wednesday's event was rare — only five earthquakes of magnitude 8.5 and above have occurred in the past 20 years — but it occurred in a region that is one of the most earthquake prone in the world. Kamchatka Peninsula lies on the Circum-Pacific seismic belt, more popularly known as the 'Ring of Fire', that witnesses the maximum number of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions on Earth. This seismically active belt encircles almost the entire Pacific Ocean — on its eastern side is the western coast of the Americas, and on its western side lies the Far East and Oceania. It touches countries like the United States, Mexico, Chile, Peru, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Japan and Russia. According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the Ring of Fire accounts for more than 80% of the planet's largest earthquakes. The biggest recorded earthquake, of magnitude 9.5 in Chile in 1960, occurred in this belt, and so did a magnitude 9.2 event in Alaska in 1964. In fact, each of the 23 events of 8-plus magnitude recorded in the last 20 years have happened along this seismic belt. The nearly 2,000-km long region extending from Kamchatka Peninsula in the north to northern Japan in the south, and including the volcanically-active Kuril Islands of Russia, has witnessed more than 130 earthquake events of 7-plus magnitude since 1900, USGS data show. In 1952, this region even recorded a magnitude 9 earthquake. The Circum-Pacific seismic belt is home to multiple subduction processes, in which the Pacific tectonic plate is clashing against continental land. Subduction is a geological process in which one tectonic plate — put simply, a large section of the Earth's crust — presses against another. Usually, the heavier or denser plate, that is, the one with more mass per unit of area, tends to go below the lighter plate. But this process results in deformities and creates a huge stress at the plate boundaries. It is this stress that is released in the form of earthquakes. The Himalayas were created due to subduction, as a result of the Indian plate pushing against the Eurasian plate. This is also the reason why the Himalayan region is one of the most earthquake-prone in the world. Vineet Gehlot, director of the Dehradun-based Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, says that the region is one of the very few areas where subduction is being observed over land. 'A majority of the subduction zones are under the sea,' he told The Indian Express. 'The Pacific Ocean, particularly the so-called Ring of Fire region, is witnessing several such processes. The Pacific plate is denser, and is subducting under the continental plate at several places on both sides… There is no other place on Earth where so many subduction processes are happening. And this is why the region produces so many earthquakes,' Gehlot said. The Circum-Pacific seismic belt is one of the three large earthquake zones of the Earth. The Alpide belt — spanning from Indonesia through the Himalayas and further to Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey — which runs mostly over the land, is the second-most earthquake-prone zone in the world. But unlike the Ring of Fire, which accounts for around 80% of all big earthquakes, the Alpide belt contributes only 15-17%, according to USGS. However, this belt traverses some of the most heavily populated areas on the planet, which makes earthquakes in the region extremely deadly. In general, while the strongest earthquakes often take place under the ocean, the ones on land, even if they are weaker, are often more deadly due to their proximity to population centres. The Kamchatka quake stuck off the coast of the peninsula, which is sparsely populated. Official statistics from 2023 put the population density in the Kamchatka Krai of the Russian federation to be roughly 0.62 persons per sq km, which is why the quake did not result in any casualties, even though the much weaker 7.6 magnitude earthquake in Nepal in 2015 killed more than 15,000 people. The third most prominent seismic belt is what is known as the mid-Atlantic ridge, which runs north-south through the middle of the entire Atlantic Ocean, from the Arctic to the Antarctic region. This subduction zone is in the middle of the ocean, deep underwater, and far away from land. This zone produces relatively moderate earthquakes, and their impact is minimal considering their distance from land. The strength of an earthquake is, in part, dependent on the length of the faultline, that is, the extent of the plate boundaries that clash against each other. A larger faultline is more likely to produce a stronger earthquake. A 9.5 magnitude earthquake, the largest that has been recorded, is essentially the limit to how strong an earthquake can be. To produce anything stronger, say an event of magnitude 10 or more, a faultline extending to almost the entire Earth would be required. No current faultline is capable of producing a quake that strong.
