the Guardian By Lucy Campbell (now); Jane Clinton, Joe Coughlan, Kate Lamb, Nick Visser and Helen Livingstone (earlier)
Klyuchevskoy volcano in Russia starts erupting
The Klyuchevskoy volcano on the Kamchatka peninsula in Russia’s far east has started erupting after Wednesday’s powerful earthquake in the Pacific, Russian state news agency RIA reported, according to Reuters.
The volcano is known to be the tallest active volcano in Eurasia…
How does the 8.8-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Russia compare with past temblors? Here’s a glance at some of the most powerful earthquakes recorded previously, according to the US Geological Survey…
An expedition group from the Russian Geographical Society was on the Kuril island of Shumshu when the tsunami swept away their tent camp, AFP reports.
“When the wave hit, all we could do was run to higher ground. It’s very difficult to do that in boots on slippery grass and in fog,” group member Vera Kostamo told Russian tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda.
“All the tents and structures were swept away by the wave, and our belongings were scattered across the beach for hundreds of metres. We have no casualties, everyone acted quickly, but we lost all our belongings.”
Authorities in the Sakhalin region, which includes the northern Kuril Islands, declared a state of emergency…
As we’ve been reporting, a tsunami wave swept through Severo-Kurilsk, a coastal Russian town on an island close to Japan, carrying buildings and debris into the sea.
Giant waves crashed through the port area and submerged a fishing plant in the town of about 2,000 people, some 350 kilometres (217 miles) southwest of the earthquake’s underwater epicentre, according to authorities.
The epicentre of the 8.8 magnitude earthquake was 47 kilometres (30 miles) beneath sea level and sent shock waves at a range of 300 kilometres (200 miles), Russia’s geophysical survey told state news agency RIA Novosti.
The waves, which were up to four metres high in some areas, reached as far as the town’s World War II monument about 400 metres (1,312 feet) from the shoreline, according to mayor of Severo-Kurilsk, Alexander Ovsyannikov.
Most of the town lies on higher ground safe from flooding, he added.
“Everyone was evacuated. There was enough time, a whole hour. So everyone was evacuated, all the people are in the tsunami safety zone,” AFP reports he said at a crisis meeting with officials earlier.
A tsunami warning for Kamchatka was lifted later on Wednesday…
READ FULL ARTICLE HERE… (theguardian.com)
Home | Caravan to Midnight (zutalk.com)
