First came the 7.0-magnitude quake with an epicenter just a few kilometers outside the peninsula’s most populated city, Petropavlovsk, with about 180,000 residents. The quake initially triggered a tsunami warning that was lifted at a later date. Several aftershocks, of considerably smaller magnitudes, also followed the first quake.
There are currently no reports of anyone being injured as a result of the quake.
But moments after the earthquake struck, the Shiveluch volcano began spewing ash, with an ash plume stretching several kilometers above the sea surface, according to geologists at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Volcanology and Seismology, AP reports.
The outbreak also triggered a short-term red warning for air traffic in the area, but afterwards no air traffic is said to have been disrupted or any damage to air infrastructure reported, AP writes with reference to the Russian state news agency TASS.
The Ebeko volcano in the Kuriles, south of the Kamchatka Peninsula, also started spewing ash after the quake, but geologists cannot say whether it is a result of the earthquake.
New and worse quakes may come
But the quake that occurred on Saturday, Swedish time, may have only been the start of something bigger. The Institute of Volcanology and Seismology is warning that another earthquake could be imminent – and could strike within 24 hours.
This time even worse. According to the institute, new earthquakes may reach 9.0 in magnitude.
In 1952, the Kamtchatka Peninsula was hit by an earthquake of the same magnitude, no deaths were reported, but nine meter high waves followed and extended all the way to Hawaii.