The 2010 Chile earthquake happened off the coast of the Maule Region of Chile, on February 27, 2010, with a magnitude of what was originally reported to be between 8.3 and 8.5 magnitude, and has since been upgraded to a possible 8.8 magnitude. It was the strongest earthquake affecting Chile since the magnitude 9.5 1960 Valdivia earthquake, and the strongest earthquake worldwide since the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake.

The 8.8 magnitude of the 2010 Chilean quake may also be compared with the 7.0 magnitude of the 2010 Haiti Earthquake.

The earthquake was also felt in the Chilean capital Santiago as well as in many Argentinean cities.

Its epicenter was offshore from the Maule Region, approximately 8 km (5.0 miles) west of Curanipe and 115 km north-northeast of Chile’s second largest city, Concepción. Other cities exposed to Mercalli intensity scale intensity VIII (Destructive) shaking were Arauco, Lota and Constitución. The quake occurred at 03:34 local time, and is reported to have lasted 10–30 seconds.

Michelle Bachelet, President of Chile, has declared a “state of catastrophe”. Warnings were issued in 53 countries.

Other Information

• Date : 27 February 2010 06:34:17 UTC (2010-02-27T06:34:17)
• Magnitude : 8.8
• Depth : 35 kilometres (22 mi)
• Epicenter location : Coordinates: 35°50′46″S 72°43′08″W / 35.846°S 72.719°W / -35.846; -72.719
• Countries or regions affected : Chile, Maule Region, Biobío Region
• Casualties : 78 deaths reported

News

• Highway Collapsed : 2010 Chile Earthquake
• Tsunami advisory canceled after 7.0 earthquake off Okinawa
• Pacific under tsunami threat after massive 8.8 quake strikes Chile
• Magnitude 6.9 earthquake shakes southern Japan, tsunami warning issued

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Buildings caught fire, others crumbled and bridges collapsed across swathes of central Chile, but the initial death toll was relatively low from a quake packing many times more power than the one that devastated Haiti last month.

An apartment block with up to 200 people inside collapsed in Concepcion, the closest major city to the epicenter, and rescue officials said they were unsure how many escaped.

Overturned cars lay scattered below a fallen overpass in the capital Santiago and telephone and power lines went down across the narrow country, making it difficult to assess the full extent of the damage and loss of life.

The government said at least 214 people were killed in the 8.8-magnitude quake, which struck at 3:34 a.m. (0634 GMT), sending people rushing from their beds and onto the streets in fear, hugging each other and crying.

"It came in waves and lasted so long. Three minutes is an eternity. We kept worrying that it was getting stronger, like a terrifying Hollywood movie," said Santiago housewife Dolores Cuevas.

Chilean officials said the number of deaths was unlikely to increase dramatically, and a U.S. Geological Survey researcher attributed the low toll to Chile’s solid building standards.

But it was the fifth-largest earthquake since 1900 and dealt a blow to the economy and infrastructure of the world’s No. 1 copper producer and one of Latin America’s most developed and stable countries. [ID:nN27181062] [ID:nN27183634]

"This will be a major blow to the country’s infrastructure; there has been major damage to roads, airports, which are now suspended, ports and also in housing," Chilean President-elect Sebastian Pinera said.

The quake halted operations at two oil refineries and two major copper mines [ID:nN27177467] and the government said an estimated half a million homes were severely damaged.

TSUNAMI

A tsunami swept into the port town of Talcahuano, causing serious damage to port facilities and lifting fishing boats out of the water. Television pictures showed shipping containers strewn around and flooded streets in the port, one of the most important in southern Chile.

President Michelle Bachelet said a huge wave hit the Juan Fernandez islands, an archipelago where Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk was marooned in the 18th century, inspiring the novel Robinson Crusoe.

"There was a series of waves that got bigger and bigger, which gave people time to save themselves," pilot Fernando Avaria told TVN television by telephone from the main island.

But at least four people were killed and 13 others were missing on the island, a local official said.

Fifteen hours after the quake struck Chile, the tsunami reached Hawaii’s Big Island, where residents and tourists were evacuated from low-lying coastal areas. The tsunami warning was later lifted for Hawaii, but Japanese officials said a wave up to 3 meters (10 feet) high could hit the country’s Pacific coast and warned residents to evacuate coastal areas.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake struck 70 miles (115 km) northeast of Concepcion at a depth of 22 miles (35 km). It said an earthquake of magnitude 8 or over can cause "tremendous damage." The Jan. 12 quake that devastated Haiti’s capital Port-au-Prince and killed well over 200,000 people was measured as magnitude 7.0.

CAPITAL DAMAGED, MINES SHUT

Chile’s capital of Santiago, about 200 miles (320 km) north of the epicenter, was also badly hit. The international airport was closed for at least 24 hours as the quake destroyed passenger walkways and shook glass out of doors and windows.

Codelco, the world’s largest copper producer, suspended operations at its El Teniente and Andina mines, but reported no major damage and said it expected the mines to be up and running in the "coming hours."

Production was halted at the Los Bronces and El Soldado copper mines, owned by Anglo American Plc, but Chile’s biggest copper mine, Escondida, was operating normally.

Chile produces about 34 percent of world supply of copper, which is used in electronics, cars and refrigerators.

In Concepcion, one of Chile’s largest cities with around 670,000 inhabitants, at least 12 buildings caught fire and rescue workers pulled 22 people from the rubble of the 15-storey apartment block that pancaked into itself.

Some residents looted pharmacies and a collapsed grains silo, hauling off bags of wheat, television images showed.

At least 269 prisoners took advantage of the quake to escape from a prison about 250 miles (450 km) south of Santiago, police said. Twenty-eight of the inmates were captured and three shot.

Broken glass and chunks of concrete and brick were strewn across roads and several strong aftershocks rattled jittery residents in the hours after the initial quake.

"It was like we were being shaken around in a box," said Claudia Rosario, a 27-year-old receptionist in Temuco, 175 miles (280 km) south of Concepcion. She said residents there were without water and electricity.

An eight-year-old boy and a man were killed in the northern Argentine city of Salta when a powerful aftershock caused walls to collapse, officials said.

There were blackouts in parts of Santiago. Emergency officials said buildings in the historic quarters of two southern cities, mainly made of adobe, had been badly damaged and local radio said three hospitals had partially collapsed.

In 1960, Chile was hit by a 9.5-magnitude earthquake, one of the biggest ever recorded. It devastated the city of Valdivia, killed 1,655 people and spawned a tsunami that engulfed the Pacific Ocean, taking another 200 lives in Japan, Hawaii and the Philippines.

President Barack Obama called Bachelet on Saturday and said the United States stood ready to help Chile. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was due to visit Chile on Tuesday on a Latin America tour. (Additional reporting by Helen Popper, Kevin Gray, Guido Nejamkis and Juliana Castilla in Buenos Aires; Alonso Soto in Santiago; Editing by Stuart Grudgings and Kieran Murray)

source: Reuters

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The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center lifted its warning for Hawaii about two hours after the series of waves hit Hawaiian shores, and later for most of the rest of the Pacific.

"It’s a big relief," said Jenifer Rhoades, the National Weather Service’s tsunami program coordinator. "It was pretty scary. We’re glad it turned out to be an event where there wasn’t tremendous impacts in terms of loss of life."

The cancellation means residents who evacuated could begin returning to their homes. More than 144,000 people lived in the evacuation zone.

The biggest waves were reported at Kahului Bay in Maui, but even there no flooding or damage was reported, said Shelly Ichishita, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Defense Civil Defense Division.

"All the evidence indicated it would be larger," said Barry Hirshorn, a geophysicist at the Tsunami warning center. "This was a very large earthquake in a part of the world that tends to produce very large tsunamis. We need to walk a line between a false alarm and missing something that’s dangerous and could kill people. Since the science is not exact, we chose to err on the side of not killing people by missing something."

A tsunami warning remained in effect for Russia and Japan.

As the tsunami neared Hawaii, triggered by a massive earthquake in Chile, Hilo International Airport on the big island of Hawaii, which is near the southern coast , was closed, and all crews aboard vessels and on the ground in state ports were ordered to evacuate. A warning siren sounded at 6 a.m. local time, alerting residents to tune into their local television and radio stations for instructions.

"We are counting on the public to follow all the instructions of our emergency personnel," said Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle. "Anyone who is ordering you to evacuate you need to take it seriously. We need you to evacuate in an orderly fashion.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano had been briefed and was monitoring developments from Vancouver, where she is leading a U.S. delegation for the Olympics.

Four Hawaii-based U.S. Coast Guard cutters prepared to get underway to ride out the tsunami at sea, and the service planned to reposition aircraft at low-lying Air Station Barbers Point near Honolulu to be able to respond if big waves hit, officials said.

Lingle declared a state of emergency, a step aimed at making needed resources available, including the National Guard. Several water pumping stations that are in low-lying areas were shut down to prevent equipment from being damaged by flooding.

washingtonpost.com

The massive quake plunged much of the Chilean capital, Santiago, into darkness as it snapped power lines and severed communications.

AFP journalists spoke of walls and masonry collapsing while people in pyjamas fled onto the streets.

Television images showed destroyed or heavily damaged buildings and debris-strewn streets.

Residents in the south of the city, which appeared to have borne the brunt of the quake, said roads had crumpled and a bridge had been damaged, as an AFP correspondent said buildings "shook like jelly."

The US Pacific Tsunami warning center issued a "widespread" tsunami warning for all Pacific nations. Related article: Pacific nations on tsunami alert

A partial evacuation of Easter Island has been ordered in Chile in the face of possible big tidal waves, President Michelle Bachelet announced.

She also said two ships with aid had been dispatched to Robinson Crusoe Island, part of the Juan Fernandez Archipelago, which has been affected by a big tidal wave.

Japan’s meteorological agency warned of a tsunami risk across large areas of the Pacific including as far away as the Antarctic, as the Philippines warned low-lying coastal areas to prepare for possible evacuation.

Australia and New Zealand issued tsunami alerts while Russia said it was monitoring the risk.

The tremor struck at 3:34 am local time (0634 GMT) when many Chileans were still in nightclubs partying at the start of the weekend.

It was swiftly followed by a series of aftershocks ranging from 5.6 to 6.9 on the Moment Magnitude Scale.

Bachelet and her officials rushed to their offices to coordinate disaster relief, state television said, as the powerful aftershocks panicked the quake-prone Latin American country.

"With the quake of this magnitude and given its timing, we cannot rule out other casualties," Bachelet said as first reports came in of deaths.

Santiago lies 325 kilometers (200 miles) northeast of the epicenter of the quake, which hit at a depth of 35 kilometers (21.7 miles).

It struck 100 kilometers (60 miles) northwest of the Chilean town of Chillan, the US Geological Survey said, and 115 kilometers (70 miles) northeast of Concepcion, a city of about a million people.

"Sea level readings confirm that a tsunami has been generated which could cause widespread damage," the US Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said.

Authorities should take "appropriate action," it added, but said the warning did not apply to the west coast of the United States.

"There is a possibility that tsunami will widely occur in the Pacific Ocean," an official for the Japanese meteorological agency said as Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines also issued warnings.

Asian nations have been on heightened alert ever since a massive 2004 tsunami that killed more than 220,000 people around the Indian Ocean.

Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama ordered his government to be prepared to offer support for victims if necessary, Jiji Press reported.

"Swift action should be required," Hatoyama told reporters. "It appears to be fairly sizable. I told ministries concerned to be ready to take measures in case relief assistance is needed."

The European Union said it stood ready to provide immediate and coordinated aid for victims.

US seismologists had initially put the magnitude of the tremor at 8.5 but later adjusted it upwards to 8.8.

Earthquake-prone Chile lies along the Pacific rim of fire and is regularly rocked by quakes, but damage is often limited as they mostly hit in desert regions which are sparsely populated.

In May 1960 the country was ravaged what is now known as Valdivia or Great Chilean Earthquake, which was rated 9.5 on the moment magnitude scale.

The resulting tsunami affected southern Chile, Hawaii, Japan, the Philippines, reaching as far as eastern New Zealand and southeast Australia.

The estimated death toll from that disaster ranged from over 2,200 to 5,700.

Vehicles that were driving along a highway that collapsed during the earthquake near Santiago are seen overturned on the asphalt Saturday Feb. 27, 1010 after an 8.8-magnitude earthquake struck central Chile early Saturday. The quake hit 200 miles (325 kilometers) southwest of the capital and the epicenter was just 70 miles (115 kilometers) from Concepcion, Chile’s second-largest city.

A tsunami advisory announced shortly after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck Japan’s Ryukyu Islands early Saturday has been canceled, Japan’s Meteorological Agency reported.

There was no tsunami damage "though there may be slight sea level changes from now on," it said, referring to the areas affected by the advisory — the Okinawa Islands, the Amami Islands and the Tokara Islands.

The quake was centered 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) deep and struck at 5:31 a.m. (3:31 p.m. ET Friday) about 85 kilometers (53 miles) from Okinawa.

The quake was felt on Okinawa, with shaking that lasted about 15 seconds, said Lt. Col. Daniel King of the U.S. Pacific Command. He told CNN that commanders in Japan and Hawaii were trying to get damage and casualty reports from U.S. military stations on Okinawa, but had heard nothing in the immediate aftermath.

About 20,000 U.S. troops — mostly Marines, along with Navy and Air Force personnel — are stationed on eight bases on Okinawa, he said.

A massive magnitude 8.8 earthquake rocked Chile early Saturday, killing at least 78 people and triggering tsunami warnings for the entire Pacific basin.

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet said she expected the death toll to rise.

Numerous aftershocks — including one of magnitude 6.9 — were felt within hours of the initial quake, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The quake’s epicenter was located off the coast of Maule, about 200 miles southwest of the capital of Santiago. It struck at 3:34 a.m. (1:34 a.m. ET), when most people were sleeping.

source

There were no reports of serious damage from the quake, believed to be the strongest in a century to hit Japan’s southern Okinawa Island. Japan’s Kyodo news agency said two people were hurt, but there were no reports of any deaths.

The Meteorological Agency says the quake occurred off the coast of the island of Okinawa at a depth of 6.2 miles (10 kilometers) at 5:31 a.m. Saturday (2031 GMT Friday).

The Meteorological Agency had initially predicted a tsunami up to 6 feet (2 meters) near the Okinawan coast and warned nearby residents to stay away from the coastline. The agency lifted the warning within two hours.

Hundreds of rescuers scrambled Tuesday to try to locate more than 60 workers trapped in a Siberian hydroelectric plant after an accident on Monday. But with only two survivors recovered, the acting chief executive of RusHydro, which owns the plant, said that most had probably drowned.

At least 12 people were confirmed dead after the bursting of a water conduit that leads to the turbines at the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydroelectric plant in the Khakassia region of Siberia, according to the Emergency Situations Ministry. As many as 64 workers from the plant, Russia’s largest power generator, were still missing as of Tuesday morning, the ministry said.

“Finding survivors in the flood zone is not likely, but we are searching,” the executive, Vitaly Zubakin, said, according to the Ria Novosti news agency. A former director at the plant, Alexander Toloshinov, told the Interfax news agency that workers could only survive if they managed to stay out of the frigid water.

Vesti television of Russia showed what it said was cellphone video showing plumes of water spewing from the plant and several loud explosions in the first few minutes after the accident.

“There was a large explosion, and the power went out,” said Irina Perepelitsina, a worker at the plant interviewed by NTV television. “The alarm went off, and we all ran to the exits.”

Sergei Shoigu, the emergency situations minister, suggested that a hydraulic pressure surge could have caused water to burst through the walls and ceiling in the engine room of Turbine No. 2, causing it to rapidly fill with water, a statement on the ministry’s Web site said. Investigators from the Prosecutor General’s Office earlier said the accident could have occurred when a transformer exploded during repairs.

Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for the prosecutor’s general’s investigative wing, said Tuesday that prosecutors were not considering a terrorist attack or sabotage as possibilities.

Meanwhile, the environmental toll continued to grow. The damaged plant has released a vast oil slick on the Yenisei River, the Natural Resources Ministry said. Power was lost to five major factories, which will now be supplied by burning coal, company officials said. Restoring the plant could take years.

Dozens Presumed Drowned at Siberian Plant