Magnitude-6.9 quake strikes near Solomon Islands; no damage

A magnitude-6.9 quake struck close to the Pacific’s Solomon Islands Monday, however there have been no studies of injury or accidents.

The quake occured 214 kilometres away from the capital Honiara and no tsunami threat has been reported.

“Based on quake information and historic tsunami records the natural disaster was not sufficient to generate a tsunami”, it said.

Australian officials estimated the undersea quake at magnitude 6.8 and said it would have been felt across hundreds of kilometres.

“It’s between Bougainville and the Guadalcanal Islands”, Duty Seismologist at Geoscience Australia Hugh Glanville told Xinhua.

It is one of the most seismically active parts of the world with a 7.0-magnitude quake striking last month off the coast of the island chain.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center did not issue any warnings for the Pacific region.

Authorities have said there could be localized damage on those islands, but they’re very sparsely populated, if populated at all.

“But there shouldn t be a tsunami and hopefully not too much damage”.

“It’s a very common quake we’ve been having in that region for the past 10, 20 years”, Glanville said.