8.2 Quake strikes eastern Russia !

Russia has issued a tsunami warning for the Sakhalin Island region in its Far East after a deep sea earthquake measured at a magnitude of 8.2 by the USGS.

‘Inhabitants need to leave dangerous regions and go to higher ground,’ the Sakhalin branch of the Russian emergencies ministry said on Friday in the warning.

The USGS placed the epicentre of the quake in the Sea of Okhotsk of the Kamchatka Peninsula at a depth of more than 600 kilometres.

Slight tremors were felt as far west as Moscow.

Marina Kolomiyets, spokeswoman for Obninsk’s seismic station of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said on Friday the epicentre was in the Sea of Okhotsk, east of the Russian coast and north of Japan. She said the quake registered 8.0 on the Richter scale.

Emergency agencies in the Far East issued a tsunami warning for Sakhalin and the Kuril islands, but lifted it soon afterwards.

Kolomiyets said the earthquake originated 600 kilometres underground and with the tremors so far down they have the potential to spread quite far.

Tremors were felt in central Moscow, prompting some people to evacuate from buildings.

Russian news agencies also cited eyewitnesses reporting strong tremors across Siberia.