Officials in Hawaii are urging residents to evacuate coastal areas and move inland following one of the strongest earthquakes ever recorded, which struck Russia’s sparsely populated Far East region early on Wednesday morning. The massive quake has generated tsunamis of up to four meters across the Pacific Ocean, prompting emergency evacuations from Hawaii to Japan.
“It’s a different beast altogether,” Hawaii Governor Josh Green warned during a press briefing, emphasizing the unprecedented nature of the threat facing Pacific coastal communities.
The earthquake, which hit the remote Russian Far East in the early morning hours, has sent shockwaves—both literal and figurative—across the Pacific Rim. Tsunami waves generated by the seismic event are now racing across the ocean, forcing emergency officials in multiple countries to implement large-scale evacuation procedures.
The mayor of Russia’s northern Kuril islands district said Wednesday that “everyone” there had evacuated to safety following a tsunami which caused flooding and swept away buildings.
“Everyone was evacuated. There was enough time, a whole hour. So everyone was evacuated, all the people are in the tsunami safety zone,” Mayor Alexander Ovsyannikov said at a crisis meeting with officials.
Hawaiian authorities have issued urgent warnings for residents and visitors to immediately move away from shorelines and seek higher ground inland. The state’s emergency management systems have been activated as officials monitor the approaching tsunami waves.
The evacuations extend far beyond Hawaii, with Japanese authorities also implementing emergency protocols as the Pacific-wide tsunami threat unfolds. The scale of the international response underscores the magnitude of the seismic event and its far-reaching consequences.
Emergency officials continue to monitor the situation as tsunami waves propagate across the Pacific, with further updates expected as the crisis develops.
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