Pacific tsunami alerts: what we know so far about the warnings stretching from Japan to the US

• An 8.8-magnitude earthquake that hit off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula early on Wednesday has caused tsunami waves in Russia, Japan and Alaska and prompted warnings for Hawaii, North and Central America and Pacific islands south toward New Zealand.The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said waves of 1 to 3 metres above tide level were possible along some coastal areas of Hawaii, Chile, Japan, Solomon Islands, Russia and Ecuador.

• The earthquake was the strongest in the region since 1952, according to the Russian Academy of Sciences, and struck at a depth of 19.3km (12 miles). It was centred 126km (80 miles) east-southeast of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, a city along Russia’s Avacha Bay. Early reports of damage have come from Russia, with Kamchatka’s governor describing the quake in a post on Telegram as “serious and the strongest in decades of tremors”. A kindergarten in the area had been damaged, he said.

• A tsunami wave swept away buildings on the coastal area of Severo-Kurilsk, the main settlement on Russia’s Kuril Islands in the Pacific, according to local officials. The regional authorities declared a state of emergency but mayor Alexander Ovsyannikov said all residents were safe and had been evacuated. The country’s emergency ministry said parts of the town had been flooded.