No damage from big earthquake
PA Wellington A big earthquake struck Samoa last night and although it caused alarm in Apia there was no report of damage or injury. “It was quite a large .’quake but it was far enough away for it not to cause any damage,” said the superintendent of the Apia Observatory, Mr Robert Unwin, in a telephone interview yesterday. “The place was really rattling round.” He said the earthquake
struck at 10.30 p.m. local time. “It just went on and on for some time, up to about two minutes. There was quite substantial rocking,” said Mr Unwin, a former D.S.I.R. official from Christchurch. Many people rushed on to the streets, when the earthquake struck. Mr Unwin said the earthquake occurred at a bad time from a communications point of view. Since the big Public Service strike in Samoa earlier this year many of the inter-
national communications links still have not been brought back into service. It is not possible to make outward calls either by telephone or telex from Apia after 11 p.m., and although Apia is on the Pacific Basinwide tsunami warning system, Mr Unwin was unable to give warning to the rest of the Pacific.
“I found that very annoying,” he said. The earthquake registered 7.5 on the Richter scale, said the United States Geological Survey.
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Press, 3 September 1981, Page 2
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223No damage from big earthquake Press, 3 September 1981, Page 2
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