The earthquake that hit the Oriental Kamchatka region of Russia and triggered Tsunami warnings throughout the Pacific is among the most powerful tremors that have been recorded in modern history.
The United States Geological Service (USGS) can review the magnitude of the earthquake, but if it remains at 8.8, this earthquake would be linked to the sixth strongest, which hit Central Chile in 2010, killing more than 500 people and destroying more than 370,000 homes.
The Russian authorities have called the last earthquake a “notable event.”
He hit a depth of approximately 13 miles, about 74 miles from the coast of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional capital in the Kamchatka Peninsula, with a population of 180,000.
Despite their strength, the first reports indicate that there have been no significant deaths or damage and that the waves of registered tsunami reached a maximum of 9.8 to 13.1 feet in Russia, 4.9 feet in Japan and 5.7 feet in Hawaii.
David Tappin, a main researcher of the British Geological Survey, said he is surprised by this.
“When I first saw that it was 8.8, I must admit, I thought: ‘Oh, we will return to Japan,” he said, referring to the 2011 earthquake that triggered a huge tsunami, killing more than 20,000 people and causing a collapse in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
Now known as the “great earthquake of Tohoku”, had a magnitude of 9.1, the most powerful room ever registered. The waves of that tsunami reached up to 130 feet, according to the Oceanic and Atmospheric National Administration, hitting the coast at a height of approximately 50 feet.
“At present, it seems quite anomalous. 8.8 Magnitude that generates a 4 -meter tsunami seems very unusual, but … the information on the impact of the tsunami is still quite limited,” said Tappin, and added that he would have waited for a tsunami of at least 10 meters, or about 33 feet.
He said that the relatively insignificant damage reported so far could be due to the distance of the epicenter and the effectiveness of the warning systems.
“It seems to me that the warning system was launched, and initially warnings were given in Japan, Hawaii and on the west coast of the United States, so it only demonstrates the importance of having these warning systems,” said Tappin. “In this case, maybe the tsunami was not great, but saves people’s lives.”
The fifth most leading earthquake ever registered, a 9.0 tremor, also hit the Kamchatka region in 1952. His epicenter was less than 19 miles of this. In that disaster, the waves reached up to 50 feet and killed at least 1,790 people, and some historians put the death toll up to 8,000, according to the historic Military Society Russia.
The region has experienced almost 700 earthquakes with magnitudes greater than 5.0 since 1990, according to the USGS.
The most powerful earthquake ever registered was the magnitude earthquake-9.5 “Valdivia” or “Gran Chileno”, which Central Chile hit in 1960, killing more than 1,600 people and leaving 2 million homeless people.
One of the most mortal earthquakes in the world was the third most powerful registered, which hit the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, on boxing day in 2004. The earthquake of magnitude 9.1 triggered massive tsunamis that reaches up to 100 feet and killed 280,000 estimated people.
