6.2-magnitude earthquake rocks Philippines

A 6.2 magnitude earthquake has struck off Negros Island in the Philippines, according to the U.S. Geological survey.

The quake, which struck at 20:47 GMT, had its epicenter 78 miles (126 kilometers) west-northwest of the city of Dumaguete on Negros Island and 357 miles (576 kilometers) south-southeast of Manila, the Philippine capital, at a depth of 11.8 miles (19 kilometers).

The quake was followed by a 5.1-magnitude aftershock at 21:03 GMT.
No Tsunami warning was issued following the quake and there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

Quake hits off Philippine coast, no damage

A 6.2-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of the Philippines on Tuesday but caused no damage, authorities said.

The US Geological Survey said the quake occurred at 4:47 am (2047 GMT), 125 kilometres (78 miles) west of Negros island, at a depth of 19 kilometres.
The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said the quake struck in the Sulu Sea 93 kilometres southwest of Dumaguete City, one of the major cities on Negros.
Authorities were confident the quake caused no damage, according to Nazario Caro, a duty officer with the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council on the neighbouring island of Panay.
"We did not issue any tsunami alert. We have checked the nearby areas and we did not get any reports of damage or casualties," Caro told AFP by telephone.
The Philippines sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire -- a belt around the Pacific Ocean dotted by active volcanoes and tectonic trenches, where frequent eruptions and earthquakes take place.

Another Big 6.7 Magnitude earthquake strikes off Indonesia

Hundreds of residents fled an Indonesian port town for higher ground on Monday when an earthquake struck south of Java with a magnitude estimated by US seismologists at 6.7.
The epicentre in the Indian Ocean was 24 kilometres (15 miles) miles deep, the US Geological Survey said, after initially estimating it at 10 kilometres underground, and 277 kilometres south of the Javanese coast.
Indonesian seismologists put the magnitude at 7.1 and issued a tsunami warning, saying the tremor had the potential to cause a killer wave and asking recipients of its public alert SMS to warn others of the danger.
The warning was later cancelled.
When the quake struck hundreds of residents in the seaport town of Cilacap fled inland and to higher ground by motorbike, car and on foot, an AFP reporter said.
"They were all panicking and shouting 'quake, quake'," the reporter said.
Suharjono, the technical head of Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, who like many Indonesians uses only one name, said shaking from the tremor had been felt in Pangandaran and Cilacap districts in Java.
"This quake roused people from their sleep," he said. "We have not received any reports of damage or casualties so far."
The US Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre had said that there was no risk of a widespread destructive wave, but there was a "very small possibility of a local tsunami".
The earthquake epicentre was 241 kilometres from the remote Australian territory of Christmas Island, and seismologists said the tremor was felt there, but no tsunami warning alert was issued for Australia.
"We had reports from there that they felt it," Geoscience Australia seismologist David Jepson told AFP, adding that it was described as a "moderate type quake".
Geoscience Australia put the quake at 6.7 magnitude.