Major 7.1 quake hits Alaska, local tsunami warning

Sep 02, 2011 |

Washington

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A major 7.1-magnitude earthquake struck Alaska's Aleutian Islands early on Friday, triggering a tsunami warning for the remote region, the US Geological Survey reported.

The quake occurred at 1:55am (1055 GMT) at a depth of 33 miles (35km), some 80 miles (130km) from the town of Dutch Harbour, one of several spots in the Pacific island chain that host commercial fishing operations.

The epicenter was some 1,000 miles (1,600km) from the state's largest city Anchorage, USGS added.

The temblor triggered an alert by the West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center, which said a tsunami warning was in effect for parts of coastal Alaska, but that ‘a widespread destructive tsunami threat does not exist.’

The Aleutian Islands sit on the Pacific Ring of Fire, a horseshoe-shaped seismic belt some 25,000 miles (40,000km) long where the majority of the world's earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occur.

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