Eyewitness footage shot on Wednesday (July 30) captured the moment of a tsunami hitting a Russian town, following a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off the country’s Far Eastern Kamchatka Peninsula.
The videos showed buildings and other debris in the town of Severo-Kurilsk being washed inland by the strong waves and the entire shoreline inundated.
Reuters was able to confirm the location by buildings, water body and terrain which match with satellite images. Reuters was able to confirm the date by the corroborating local reports and official statements.
The large quake has prompted warnings and evacuations stretching across the Pacific Ocean. Several people were injured in the remote Russian region, while much of Japan's eastern seaboard - devastated by a powerful earthquake and tsunami in 2011 - was ordered to evacuate.
The US Geological Survey said the earthquake was shallow at a depth of 19.3 km (12 miles), and was centred 119 km (74 miles) east-southeast of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, a city of 165,000. It revised the magnitude up from 8.0 earlier, and reported a strong aftershock of magnitude 6.9 soon after.
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