Strong Quake Hits Kuril Islands

An earthquake with a magnitude of 8.1 struck the waters off the Kuril Islands about 110 miles northeast of the island of Hokkaido, Japan on November 15. Areas in the Pacific including Japan, Russia and Hawaii were temporarily under tsunami watches and warnings following the quake, which occurred at 6:15 a.m., EST, but those alerts were later lifted. According to TV reports in Japan, there were evacuations and some waves were noted, but there had been no early reports of damage.