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WELLINGTON: Tens of thousands of coastal residents in New Zealand, New Caledonia and Vanuatu fled to higher ground on Friday (March 5) when a group of powerful earthquakes triggered a tsunami watch across the Pacific.
Warning sirens sounded in Noumea as authorities ordered evacuations amid fears that waves of up to three meters were heading towards French territory.
“People should leave beach areas and stop all water activities, and should not pick up their children from schools to avoid traffic jams,” emergency services spokesman Alexandre Rosignol told public radio.
In New Zealand, communities along stretches of the North Island were warned to flee as tsunami warning sirens sounded after a magnitude 8.1 earthquake, which followed previous tremors in the same region of 7.4 and 7.2. .
“Don’t stay home,” said the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).
“People close to the coast … should immediately move to the nearest high ground, outside of all tsunami evacuation zones, or as far inland as possible.”
Workers, students and residents in areas such as Northland and the Bay of Plenty, on the north coast near Auckland, were assisted by civil defense officials.
Meanwhile, an emergency alert was issued for all coastal areas around Auckland, a city of 1.7 million, where people were told to stay away from the water’s edge. There were no reports of damage or casualties from the earthquakes.
“The first wave may not be the biggest,” Bill Fry, a seismologist with the geoscience body GNS, told a televised news conference in the capital Wellington.
“Tsunami activity will continue for several hours and the threat must be considered real until this warning is canceled,” he added.
The largest of the earthquakes occurred about 1,000 kilometers off the coast of New Zealand at 8.28 a.m. (3.28 a.m. Singapore time), the United States Geological Survey said.
(Image: United States Geological Survey)
It was preceded by two seismic shakes that were also enormously powerful, in an unusually strong cluster even for the Pacific Ring of Fire, where Earth’s tectonic plates collide.
New Zealand’s NEMA said the remoteness of the earthquakes did not minimize their potential impact.
“The earthquake may not have been felt in some of these areas, but evacuation should be immediate as a damaging tsunami is possible,” he said.
COASTAL RESIDENTS ON ALERT
The US Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said Vanuatu and New Caledonia are likely to experience the largest waves, measuring up to three meters.
“Based on all available data, dangerous tsunami waves are forecast for some coasts,” he said.
He said that smaller initial waves had already been reported in Tonga, and that small waves were also possible as far away as Japan, Russia, Mexico and the South American coast.
Australia issued a marine tsunami threat to Norfolk Island, a small Australian territory with around 1,750 residents, but said there was no threat to the mainland.
Norfolk Island residents in areas threatened by flooding or flooding were advised to go to higher ground or inland, the Bureau of Meteorology said. Residents were also told to get out of the water and back from shore on beaches, marinas, coastal estuaries, and rock platforms.
Chile said it could experience a minor tsunami.
The US Pacific Tsunami Warning Center canceled a tsunami warning for Hawaii on Thursday. The agency also previously canceled a tsunami warning it had issued for American Samoa.
In American Samoa, officials rang village church bells and police in marked vehicles and fire trucks used loudspeakers to broadcast the threat because the territory’s regular outdoor warning system has been out of order since the last year.
Repairs have been suspended because flights to American Samoa were suspended amid the pandemic and technicians were unable to make the trip.
Residents were not at risk after a 2009 tsunami killed 34 people in American Samoa and caused significant damage.
FIRST EARTHQUAKE
The 7.2 magnitude earthquake that struck New Zealand’s eastern North Island was felt by more than 60,000 people across the country, with many describing the quake as “severe.” Aftershocks were still being recorded in the area.
No damage or injuries were reported from previous earthquakes, which generated tsunami warnings that were later lifted.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was one of the people given an early morning wake-up.
“I hope everyone is well, especially on the east coast, they would have felt the full force of that earthquake,” he posted on Instagram after the initial shaking at 2.27 a.m. M. (9.25 pm, Singapore time).
New Zealand experiences frequent seismic and volcanic activity, but Emergency Services Minister Kiri Allan said it has never experienced such a strong sequence of earthquakes before.
“This has been an extraordinary morning for many New Zealanders across the country,” he said.
“Since 2:30 am this morning they have been awake, worried about their homes and their families.”
The South Pacific nation recently marked the 10th anniversary of the Christchurch earthquake, when a 6.3 earthquake killed 185 in the South Island city.
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