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An aerial view of islets in the Solomon Islands chain, on September 4, 2011/AFP

World

Five dead as quake off Solomons sparks tsunami

The US Geological Survey said the quake struck the Santa Cruz Islands, which have been rocked by a series of strong tremors over the past week, at a depth of 28.7 kilometres (18 miles). The USGS first gave the depth at 5.8 kilometres.

Several powerful aftershocks were also recorded.

“Sea level readings indicate a tsunami was generated,” the Hawaii-based Pacific centre said after the 8.0 quake, before lifting its tsunami alert for several island nations.

Australia’s earthquake monitoring agency and the Pacific centre said a tsunami wave was measured at 91 centimetres, at Lata, on the main Santa Cruz island of Ndende.

Locals in the Solomons capital Honiara, 580 kilometres (360 miles) from the epicentre, said the quake was not felt there.

Lata Hospital director of nursing Augustine Bilve said some patients were evacuated to higher ground to prepare for any injured from the villages along the coast.

“There was continuous shaking in Lata but no damaged buildings here,” he said.

“We were told that after the shaking, waves came to the villages.”

In 2007 a tsunami following an 8.0-magnitude earthquake killed at least 52 people in the Solomons and left thousands homeless. The quake was so powerful that it lifted an island and pushed out its shoreline by dozens of metres.

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The Solomons are part of the “Ring of Fire”, a zone of tectonic activity around the Pacific Ocean that is subject to earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

Before it was lifted, the tsunami warning was in effect for the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, New Caledonia, Kosrae, Fiji, Kiribati, and Wallis and Futuna.

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