Huge underwater quake hits Russian Far East

GlobalPost

A massive undersea earthquake with an estimated 8.3 magnitude shook Russia Friday, with tremors recorded in Moscow — almost 4,400 miles west of the epicenter of the temblor. 

The quake hit in the Sea of Okhotsk at a depth of over 370 miles off the shore of Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula, according to data recorded by the US Geological Survey.

Read more from GlobalPost: 5.9 earthquake hits Fukushima coast

Russian authorities swiftly issued a tsunami warning for Sakhalin Island — Russia's largest — and areas nearby, wrote Agence France-Presse, but the warning was lifted after no wave appeared to be imminent. No casualties were reported. 

"The whole plate — on which the continent stands — shook," Anatoly Tsygankov of Russia's Rosgidromet environmental monitoring service said to AFP. 

"And this movement of the continental plate was felt all over Russia — not just in Moscow, we received calls from Nizhny Novgorod and other cities."

Tremors felt in Moscow didn't pass 1 on the Richter scale, reported RT.com, but panicked Muscovites placed calls to security services and left their homes, concerned as their furniture began to shake.

The Associated Press noted that such tremors are exceptionally rare in Moscow, and the last such incident was recorded way back in 1977. Tremors were also reported as far away as Siberia. 

Here's video of swaying buildings in downtown Moscow: 

Others took to social media, posting photos of evacuated citizens and other aftermath:

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