Massive 7.6 Magnitude Earthquake Strikes Caribbean
The Caribbean region was hit with a massive earthquake Tuesday night, leading to tsunami warnings for multiple nations in the surrounding area.
The epicenter of the 7.6 magnitude earthquake was in the Caribbean Sea, between the coasts of Honduras and the Cayman Islands.
It is believed to have been one of the strongest earthquakes to strike the region in modern memory, according to USA Today.
The quake, which struck at around 10 p.m., did not cause any serious damage or injuries. The northern coast of Honduras closest to the quake’s epicenter has few people living on it.
The quake was originally measured as having a magnitude of 7.8, but it was later downgraded to a 7.6 instead.
Tsunami warnings initially went into effect in countries like Puerto Rico, the Cayman Islands, Cuba, Jamaica and other Central American nations.
“Tsunami waves reaching 0.3 to 1 meters above the tide level are possible for some coasts,” the U.S. Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said in a statement, according to CNN.
People living in coastal centers were told to go to higher ground.
“If you notice that the (sea) disappears, you have to go to (a) high place,” said Juan Jose Reyes, the director of Early Warning Systems for COPECO, a Honduran disaster prevention agency COPECO.
“Pay attention to the alerts, to the authorities,” he added, while speaking at a news briefing in the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa.
No tsunamis were expected to hit the East or Gulf Coasts of the U.S., Fox News reported, though a warning was issued for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Moreover, the tsunami warnings were lifted for most of the Caribbean after authorities in the U.S. determined there was no longer any imminent threat, according to CNBC.
Tuesday night’s earthquake came almost 8 years to the day that Haiti was devastated by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010.
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