Map Shows Wave Path as Tsunami Warning Issued after Argentina Quake.
A small tsunami of .5 meters has struck the Antarctica Peninsula, a United States Geological Survey (USGS) spokesperson told Newsweek, and residents of southern Chile and southern Argentina are now evacuating. Both countries are at risk of a tsunami following a major earthquake that struck in the Drake Passage south of Argentina and north of Antarctica on Friday morning.
A tsunami is a series of waves that can be caused by earthquakes, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said. A 7.4 magnitude earthquake struck 219 kilometers south of Ushuaia, Argentina, on Friday. The USGS said it recorded the quake with a depth of 10 kilometers.
After the quake struck, a warning from the U.S. Tsunami Warning Centers said tsunami waves were possible within 300 kilometers of the earthquake’s epicenter. This includes Puerto Williams and Puerto Toro in southern Chile.
“The magnitude 7.4 earthquake occurred in the remote, offshore region of the Drake Passage, south of the southernmost tip of Chile. The USGS expects that the shaking related impacts from this earthquake will be minimal,” the USGS spokesperson told Newsweek. “NOAA Tsunami Warning Centers indicated that there is a tsunami threat in southern Chile and Antarctica, with potential wave heights of 0.3 – 3 meters. The Warning Centers additionally indicate that there is currently no threat to US States or Territories, in either the Pacific or Atlantic Oceans. Given the magnitude and location of the earthquake, and the style of faulting, the generation of a small tsunami would not be surprising. The most up to date information on tsunami alerts can be found at NOAA’s tsunami.gov website.”
Residents in Magallanes, Chile, were urged to evacuate. An alert from Chile’s disaster agency asked them “to act calmly and follow the instructions of the authorities and response teams. During evacuation, don’t forget to consider your pet and its needs.”
Numerous aftershocks ranging from magnitude 4.9 to 5.7 have also struck. Aftershocks also can cause tsunamis, although this doesn’t occur frequently.
The tsunami could hit the coast of Chile by 18:55 p.m. UTC (2:55 p.m. ET), nearly six hours after the major quake.
“The speed of tsunami waves depends on ocean depth rather than the distance from the source of the wave,” NOAA said in a webpage about tsunamis. “Tsunami waves may travel as fast as jet planes over deep waters, only slowing down when reaching shallow waters.”
The National Service for Disaster Prevention and Response (SENAPRED) said that “communes of the coastal edge of the Magallanes Region and the Chilean Antarctic Territory” are included in the alert territory. The most recent update on SENAPRED’s website says nearly 2,000 people have evacuated.
A translation of a post on X, formerly Twitter, by social media account @TuiteroSismico: “Although the app always shows the nearest city (Ushuaia), the closest settlement is Puerto Williams and Puerto Toro, the southernmost Chilean settlement in the world.”
Social media user @mariseka shared an image of people evacuating on X, with the translation: “I want to highlight the exemplary behavior of the people in Magallanes during the evacuation due to the tsunami alert. In this photo from Punta Arenas, you can see the calm with which they acted. Evacuating calmly not only reduces risks, but also allows everyone to reach safe areas without panic or confusion.”
A tsunami could strike Southern Chile in less than four hours as of publication of this article. Evacuations are ongoing, and SENAPRED response teams have been deployed.