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Japan on Wednesday issued a tsunami warning for the country's Pacific coast after a magnitude 8.8 earthquake struck off Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula, with waves of up to 50 centimeters recorded in parts of northern and eastern Japan, Kyodo News reported.
The warning disrupted railway and air services along the coast and led the operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to halt the release of treated radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean, as per Kyodo News. The Japan Meteorological Agency warned of tsunami waves of up to 3 meters reaching areas stretching from Hokkaido in northern Japan to Wakayama Prefecture in the west and the Ogasawara Islands in the south. The warning could remain in effect for the entire day, the agency said. A 50 cm-tsunami was recorded at Ishinomaki Port in Miyagi Prefecture at 11:51am (local time), while a 40 cm-wave was detected in Oarai, Ibaraki Prefecture, at 11:38am. Tsunami waves of up to 30 cm were observed in Nemuro and Kushiro, eastern Hokkaido, and Ofunato and Kamaishi in Iwate Prefecture, northeastern Japan, Kyodo News reported. Japan's Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba vowed to take all possible measures to ensure the safety of the public, ordering ministries and agencies to mitigate any damage from the tsunami. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told a hastily arranged press conference that the government is confirming the situation, while calling on people in areas covered by the warning to evacuate to higher ground. The quake occurred at 8:24am around 120 kilometers east-southeast of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky at a depth of about 20 km, according to the US Geological Survey. Tsunami waves measuring up to 4 meters were detected off southeastern Kamchatka, with several people injured, according to Russia's Tass news agency. The quake registered 2 on Japan's seismic intensity scale of 7 in Hokkaido, the Japanese weather agency said. The tsunami warning prompted Sendai airport in Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan, to close its runways, while JR East and JR Central halted train services near coastal areas, Kyodo News reported. (ANI)
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