Powerful Magnitude 8.8 Earthquake Near Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula Prompts Tsunami Warning For Hawaii – Tsunami Watch For Alaska, Entire US West Coast

| Published July 31, 2025

📰 What Happened

A massive earthquake of preliminary magnitude 8.7–8.8 occurred on July 30, 2025, early local time, off the eastern coast of Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, at a shallow depth of around 12–20 km and roughly 120–125 km southeast of Petropavlovsk‑Kamchatsky

Local authorities confirmed this quake was the strongest to hit Kamchatka since the record-shattering 1952 Severo‑Kurilsk earthquake.

🌊 Tsunami Warnings & Wave Activity

• Tsunami warnings and advisories were issued across a broad swath of the Pacific basin:

  • Japan (all Pacific coast zones)

  • Alaska, including the Aleutian Islands

  • Hawaii

  • U.S. West Coast (California, Oregon, Washington)

  • Chile, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, as far south as New Zealand.

• In Kamchatka, waves reached 3–4 meters, impacting towns like Severo‑Kurilsk

• Farther afield, waves of ~2–5 feet were recorded in San Francisco; California saw waves up to 3.6 feet, and Japan experienced 1–1.3 meters (~3–4 feet).

Despite the alarms, most warnings have since been downgraded or lifted, as wave impacts were generally less severe than feared.

📍 Local Effects & Aftermath

• Russia:

  • Several injuries and infrastructure damage, particularly in Russian Far East towns.

  • Kamchatka declared a state of emergency.

  • A volcano (Klyuchevskoy) erupted following the seismic event.

• Japan:

  • Evacuations along coastal regions; over 1.9 million people moved to higher ground.

  • The Fukushima nuclear plant and Sendai Airport were evacuated as precautionary measures

  • One reported fatality occurred during evacuation efforts

• United States:

  • Hawaii lifted evacuation orders but remained on tsunami advisory status.

  • Oprah Winfrey reportedly opened her private road in Maui to support evacuation logistics, helping transport residents safely—50 cars at a time

🧠 Significance & Geological Context

• Earthquake magnitude places it among the largest ever recorded: tied as the sixth strongest globally and one of the four strongest this century

• It occurred on a megathrust fault along the Kuril‑Kamchatka Trench, where the Pacific Plate subducts beneath the Okhotsk Plate—a region well-known for generating massive earthquakes and tsunamis

• Aftershocks up to magnitude 6.9 have been reported, which maintained elevated tsunami risks

SOURCES: THE GATEWAY PUNDIT – Powerful Magnitude 8.8 Earthquake Near Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula Prompts Tsunami Warning For Hawaii – Tsunami Watch For Alaska, Entire US West Coast

REUTERS – Huge quake rocks Russia’s Far East, triggering tsunami warnings around Pacific

AP NEWS – Tsunami evacuations ordered in South America, but worst risk appears to pass for US after huge quake