Whole lotta shakin'
That was one powerful earthquake this morning in the Kuril Islands north of Japan, complete with tsunami watches and warnings all around much of the Pacific basin. Many of those were later canceled, including those for Alaska, British Columbia and the state of Washington. The tsunami wave heights in the Far East turned out to be pretty small. Here's our story.
Here is the USGS report on the magnitude 8.3 main quake and the subsequent large tremors.
Here is a list of the largest quakes of 2006. It lists today's Kuril Islands quake at 7.8 on the Richter Scale. That has since been revised upwards to 8.3, making this one a "Great" quake, and certainly the biggest of the year to date.
