A 7.6-magnitude earthquake struck off Japan, prompting a tsunami warning

A major earthquake has rocked Japan’s northern coast, with the country’s weather service recording several tsunami waves and local media reporting injuries.

The United States Geological Survey said the 7.6-magnitude quake struck at 1415 GMT off Misawa on Japan’s Pacific coast at a depth of 53 kilometers (33 miles).

The Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami warning, with a wave hitting a port in the northern Aomori region, where Misawa is located, at 23:43 (1443 GMT).

Several more waves reached the coast, measuring up to 50 centimeters (20 inches), the agency said.

Public broadcaster NHK quoted a hotel employee in the town of Hachinohe in Aomori as saying there were some injuries as a result of the quake.

Live footage showed shards of glass strewn across the streets.

Residents of Hachinohe fled their homes to seek shelter at the city hall, NHK reported.

The quake was also felt in the north center of Sapporo, where alarms went off on smartphones to alert residents.
An NHK reporter in Hokkaido described a horizontal shaking of about 30 seconds that left him unable to stand as the quake struck.

The weather service earlier warned that a tsunami of up to three meters (10 feet) was expected to hit Japan’s Pacific coast.

Senior government spokesman Minoru Kihara urged residents to stay in a safe place until the warning is lifted.

“Even after an initial wave, a second or third wave of even greater height may arrive,” he told reporters.

“Megaseismic”

Kihara said he had “not yet received any reports of anomalies” from two nuclear plants in northern Japan, adding that investigations were continuing at other nuclear facilities.

In 2011, a magnitude 9.0 earthquake triggered a tsunami that left 18,500 dead or missing and caused a catastrophic meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Shortly after Monday’s earthquake, Tohoku Electric Power said in a post on X that safety equipment at the Higashidori nuclear power plant in Aomori and the Onagawa nuclear plant in Miyagi Prefecture showed no abnormalities.

Japan sits atop four major tectonic plates along the western edge of the Pacific ‘Ring of Fire’ and is one of the most tectonically active countries in the world.

The archipelago, home to about 125 million people, experiences about 1,500 tremors each year.

The vast majority are mild, although the damage they cause varies depending on their location and depth below the Earth’s surface.

Earthquakes are notoriously difficult to predict, but in January a government panel marginally raised the chance of a major quake in Japan’s Nankai Trough in the next 30 years to 75-82 percent.

The government then released a new estimate in March saying such a “megaquake” and subsequent tsunami could cause up to 298,000 deaths and up to $2 trillion in damage.