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Andaman quake leads to tsunami alert for hrs

Star Report
The Met office yesterday withdrew the tsunami alert it issued in Uie early hours following an earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter Scale off the Andaman Islands.
It said Dhaka. Chinagong, Sylhet and the southern region felt the quake at 2:55:42am Bangladesh time, which lasted a few seconds. It had its epicentre 980 kilometres south-southeast of the Met Office in Dhaka.
"The tsunami alert was issued around 4:00am, which was withdrawn at about 6:40am," Meteorologist Mominul Islam told The Daily Star.
"According to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre and Japan Meteorological Agency, devastating tsunami is
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unlikely to affect the coast of Bangladesh as the expected time of 06:40am (BST) TUesday was over,” said a bulletin of the Met Office.
“There is no signal for the maritime ports of Bangladesh,” it said.
The US Geological Survey said a quake with a 7.6 magnitude hit the Indian Ocean about 257 kilometres north of Port Blair in India's Andaman Islands. Met office in Dhaka, however, said the magnitude of the tremor was 7.8.
Panicked people, mostly sleeping, came out of their homes after the quake jolted their houses in parts of the country. However, no casualty or damage has been reported in the earthquake.
Our correspondent from Chittagong said city dwellers woke up when the tremor hit. Panic-stricken people came out of their homes with family members and took shelter on roads to escape casualty.
Ferdous Ara, a housewife in the city's Dewanhat area, said she woke up experiencing the shake that lasted a few seconds. "It was an awful experience when my bed was shaking and 1 got out of my fifth floor residence with my family members,” she added.
The powerful earthquake hit Tokyo and nearby areas shortly after dawn Tuesday, halting trains and forcing two nuclear reactors to shut down for safety checks. More than 30 people suffered minor injuries.
The Andaman Islands' quake was 33 kilometres deep, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
A tsunami watch was also called for India, Myanmar, Indonesia, Thailand and Bangladesh. The caution was later lifted without any tsunami being recorded, news agency Associated Press adds.
In Japan's magnitude-6.5 temblor, at least seven people were slightly hurt, the National Police Agency said. Public broadcaster NHK reported 43 were injured.
Japan's Meteorological Agency, which downgraded the quake to 6.6, also issued a tsunami warning, but that was later lifted. The quake was centred off Suruga Bay, southwest of Tokyo, at a depth of 20 kilometres.
A small increase of waves of up to 60 centimetres was observed along the coastline ofYaizu city, the agency said.
More than 30 people were hurt but none seriously, said officials in the two hardest-hit prefectures (stales), Shizuoka and Aichi.
"The shaking was quite strong, even here. It wasn t the usual little ones," said Mitsuharu Wakamori, a police official in Aichi, about 140 kilometres west of the quake's centre. "I was nervous at the beginning, but now I'm relieved that the damage seems to be minor."
Two reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant were temporarily halted for safety checks. No damage was reported. Reactors are automatically shut down whenever a quake of a certain strength is registered.
Koki Saguchi of Chubu Electric Power Co. said no problem or damage was initially detected at the reactors. Plant workers were to inspect the reactors fully before resuming operation. The inspection was expected to take at least half a day.
The tremble prompted Central Japan Railway Co. to stop operations of Shinkansen bullet trains briefly, and some local trains were still out of service hours later, the company said. Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura told reporters that the government set up a task force at the prime minister's office.
"We are trying to assess the extent of damage as quickly as possible," Kawamura said. "We'll do our best to rescue those who were affected." A magnitude 6.9 quake rattled the region Sunday, but caused no damage or casualties. The U.S. Geological Survey measured it at magnitude 7.1.
Japan is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries, and experts believe Tokyo has a 90 percent chance of being hit by a major quake over the next 50 years. In 1995, a magnitude-7.2 quake in the western port city of Kobe killed 6,400 people.
Katsuyuki Abe, a Tokyo University seismology professor, said experts were studying whether Tuesday's quake could foreshadow a major temblor that experts have warned is imminent in the region. Tokyo was devastated by an earthquake in 1923, and experts say it is overdue for another major jolt.
"We are closely monitoring the developments and examining any changes in the region," he said.