Magnitude 7.4 quake hits off Alaskan coast
A powerful quake of magnitude 7.4 struck in the northern Pacific Ocean between the tip of Alaska’s Aleutian Islands and Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, the U.S. Geological Survey said Monday.
The quake struck at 1:34 a.m. Tuesday some 125 miles from the city of Nikol’skoye on Bering island off the Kamchatka Peninsula. The epicenter was west of Attu, the westernmost and largest island in the Near Islands group of Alaska’s remote Aleutian Islands.
The earthquake, initially reported as a magnitude 7.7, was very shallow — only 7.4 miles below the seabed, which would have amplified its effect, but it was quite far from any mainland.
The U.S. Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said “hazardous tsunami waves are possible for coasts located within 186 miles of the earthquake epicenter.”
Tsunami waves, however, were unlikely to reach Kamchatka’s eastern coast, some 310 miles away.
The quake was followed by several aftershocks, including a couple above magnitude 5.0.
