Earthquake Hit Santa Cruz Islands

Magnitude-7.8 and 7.3 earthquakes struck the Santa Cruz Islands at 11:03 a.m. New Zealand time triggering tsunami warnings for several nations in the region but was later canceled.

The quakes hit at 11:03 a.m. New Zealand at a depth of 35 kilometers (22 miles), about 260 kilometers south of Lata on the Santa Cruz Islands and 295 kilometers north-northwest of Vanuatu, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

It earlier measured the quake at magnitude 8.1. The second 7.3-magnitude quake struck about 15 minutes later in the area, the USGS said. A third 5.7 magnitude earthquake hit at 12.48pm New Zealand time.

Earlier, tsunami warnings of varying levels were in effect for Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu, New Caledonia, Fiji, Kiribati, Kosrae, Wallis-Futuna, Howland-Baker, Marshall Islands, Tokelau, Kermadec Islands, Pohnpei, New Zealand, Samoa, American Samoa, Tonga, Australia, Niue, Cook Islands, Chuuk, Indonesia, Wake Islands, Jarvis Islands, Belau, Midway Islands, French Polynesia, Hawaii, and Philippines.

A tsunami is a series of water waves that is caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, such as an ocean.