Moscow: A fresh tsunami warning was issued after a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the Kuril Islands, close to Kamchatka in Russia’s far east, on Sunday. Russia’s Ministry for Emergency Services has warned that tsunami waves are possible in three areas of Kamchatka.
The Kuril Islands stretch from the southern tip of Kamchatka Peninsula. Russian scientists had warned on Wednesday that strong aftershocks were possible in the region in the next several weeks. This was following the massive earthquake that struck the area last week.
“The expected wave heights are low, but you must still move away from the shore,” the ministry said on the Telegram messaging app.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning System, which gauged the quake at 7.0, however said that there was no tsunami warning after the quake. The US Geological Survey also pegged the earthquake at a magnitude of 7.
In a related event, the Krasheninnikov Volcano in Kamchatka erupted for the first time in 600 years, Russia’s RIA state news agency and scientists reported on Sunday. Both incidents could be connected to the huge earthquake that rocked Russia’s far east last week, triggering tsunami warnings as far away as French Polynesia and Chile. This was followed by an eruption of Klyuchevskoy, the most active volcano on the Kamchatka Peninsula.
“This is the first historically confirmed eruption of the Krasheninnikov Volcano in 600 years,” RIA cited Olga Girina, head of the Kamchatka Volcanic Eruption Response Team, as saying.
On the Telegram channel of the Institute of Volcanology and Seismology, Girina said that Krasheninnikov’s last lava effusion took place within 40 years of 1463 and no eruption has been known since.
The Kamchatka branch of Russia’s ministry for emergency services said that an ash plume rising up to 6,000 meters (3.7 miles) has been recorded following the volcano’s eruption. The volcano itself stands at 1,856 metres.
“The ash cloud has drifted eastward, toward the Pacific Ocean. There are no populated areas along its path,” the ministry said on Telegram. The eruption has been assigned an orange aviation code, indicating a heightened risk to aircraft, the ministry said.
