Powerful 6.7-quake in Andamans triggers tsunami alert
India’s Andaman Islands was hit by a 6.7-magnitude earthquake on Friday, June 27 at 5:40pm. But officials and police said that there were no immediate reports of deaths or loss of property.
The quake-hit area was about 75 miles southwest of Port Blair, the capital of Andaman, causing the residents to panic. According to the police in the Andamans, no one was injured, and no property was damaged.
The Indian Meteorological Department described the quake as moderate, while the Japan Meteorological Agency said there was “a very small possibility of a destructive local tsunami in the Indian Ocean.” A “local tsunami alert” was issued for the Andamans by the Indian Tsunami Warning System, set up after the 2004 tsunami that killed about 10,000 people in India.
“We have issued a local alert in the Andamans. But I don’t think there is any point to get panicky,” said a senior seismologist with the India Meteorological Department (IMD). “We have received information about tremors being felt in the Andamans and in parts of Chennai.”
A quake of 8 or more on the Richter scale can potentially generate a tsunami, but the IMD was not taking the current tremor lightly even though it measured less than 8.
Located some 1,400 kilometers southeast of India’s mainland, the Andaman and Nicobar territories comprise more than 500 islands. Approximately 350,000 people live on 30-to-40 of the islands. The tiny islands are so close to the epicenter of the massive Asian earthquake, that the tsunami hit them almost immediately.
In December 2004 the islands were attacked by a huge tsunami triggered by an earthquake in the Indian Ocean near Indonesia. Coastal areas of the Andamans were devastated, and scores of people were killed.
As a result of the earthquake in December 2004, South and Middle Andaman Islands are now 2m lower than they were previously – so the water in these areas is now 2m deeper than charted.
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