8.2 Earthquake Off the Coast of Chile, Tsunami Triggered

An 8.2-magnitude earthquake has struck roughly 60km off the cost of Chile. Its depth was approximately 20.1km. A tsunami has been generated, and evacuations have been ordered along the coast near the strike. Tsunami warnings were also issued for Peru and Ecuador. According to the Associated Press, "Coastal residents of northern Chile evacuated calmly as waves measuring almost 2 meters (6 1/2 feet) struck ahead of a tsunami that was expected to come ashore later. ... Chile's emergency service reported some roads blocked by landslides caused by the quake, but said no injuries had been reported so far."

Comments

How can different news sources

[future assassin]

get the magnitude wrong.

7.7
8.2
8.0

http://www.google.org/publical...

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/c...

http://www.latimes.com/world/w...

Re:How can different news sources

[Anonymous Coward]

Most likely those are estimates based on the data available at each location. As time moves forward the magnitud will converge.

Re:How can different news sources

[jrumney]

Initial reports of earthquakes always have differing magnitudes, based on different data sources. It is only a couple of days later when all the data is analysed together that a consistent magnitude is agreed on.

Re:How can different news sources

[jrumney]

USGS is involved in all major earthquake measurement - the waves travel around the world in an earthquake of this size, and often the precise magnitude is more accurately determined at a distance.

earthquakes here at home

[Anonymous Coward]

Posting from Chile here. Chile is an extremely seismic country. Construction codes and techniques require and plan for buildings to resist a 9.0 earthquake (by resist it's meant that no matter the damage to the building, even if it becomes uninhabitable, it should allow all the occupants to evacuate safely) and usually anything below 7.6 is not really reported as a major earthquake. In 2010 we had a major earthquake (8.8, 11th strongest in recorded history) and all the regions that had previously experienced a major quake (1985 in Santiago,1960 in Valdivia, and so on), and thus where rebuilt using the modern construction standards, experienced very little damage due to the quake itself. Of all people that where killed in 2010, less than 1000, most of them where due to the tsunami that ensued. The southern cities however where severely damaged as many homes where quite old and built using "adobe" mud bricks.
The northern region that was hit today had already suffered two ~7.8 earthquakes in 2005 and 2007 and most of the construction was done using modern standards. The information is slowly coming in, but so far no casualties are reported. Right now all coastal cities have been evacuated as tsunami alarms where sounded, including massive SMS alerts and emergency alerts sent directly to Android phones.

Re:earthquakes here at home

[alex67500]

Right now all coastal cities have been evacuated as tsunami alarms where sounded, including massive SMS alerts and emergency alerts sent directly to Android phones.

So iPhone users can die? Sounds like Chile is way more civilised than I thought ;-)

Re:In all seriousness...

[Anonymous Coward]

Chile is in the southern hemisphere, it's actually October 1st there.

"No injuries"?

[Anonymous Coward]

From the fine article: "Officials reported two deaths and several serious injuries...". It's the first paragraph in the damn article.

The summary is at best misleading, misquoting a paragraph discussing the *peruvian* injuries (of which there are none reported). Chilean injuries and deaths have occurred. ... but this is slashdot, where outright wrong summaries are the norm.

Re:Of course it was calm

[geekoid]

Nothing and neither does New Orleans, but some people are pretty clueless and feel the need to bring up there ignorant pet issues under the flimsiest of reasons.