A powerful earthquake with a magnitude of 7.3 struck Vanuatu, causing significant damage and leading to at least one fatality. A tsunami warning was initially issued but later canceled.
At least one person has died and a mass casualty triage has been set up at a hospital in Port Vila after a magnitude-7.3 earthquake struck Vanuatu . Authorities have cancelled an initial tsunami warning after The quake struck 37km from the capital Port Vila at 12:53pm AEDT. Dan McGarry, a journalist currently in Port Vila, has been touring the downtown area of Port Vila in the wake of today's earthquake.
In an update he posted to X this evening, he says there are local reports suggesting Port Vila's airport and international shipping terminal may have been significantly damaged in the quake.Fabio Capitanio from the Monash University's School of Earth Atmosphere and Environment has provided his expert take on the earthquake in Vanuatu. 'The earthquake striking Vanuatu occurred on a very well known subduction zone, where the Indo-Australia tectonic plate subducts beneath the Pacific Plate. The magnitude of this earthquake is comparable to the explosion of Mount St. Helens in 1980'. 'The recurrence time of these earthquakes is estimated to be around every 100 years and although we have evidence of shorter recurrence times elsewhere, for example south-east Asia, the Vanuatu record is consistent with this estimate, although this cannot be used as a future projection.' He said in a statement to the Australian Science Media Centre that earthquakes of a similar magnitude can be associated with the risk of a tsunami.Earthquakes are relatively frequent in the region but today's earthquake is one of the strongest we have seen in recent years.The US embassy for Port Moresby has tweeted that people who were in the US embassy building in Vanuatu are 'safe and accounted for'.Australia's High Commissioner to Vanuatu, Max Willis, has tweeted that the Australian government is working 'on an assistance operation' with the Vanuatu government. Senator Penny Wong has spoken about the tragedy in Vanuatu while on the tarmac at Stansted Airport in Londo
Earthquake Vanuatu Tsunami Disaster Damage
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