At 13:20:00 (UTC) on the 10th February 2021, a magnitude 7.7 earthquake occurred southeast of the Loyalty Islands in the Pacific, see map below. The epicenter lies in a very remote region and only few people felt the event. The earthquake struck at a depth of 10 km and according to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center a tsunami was triggered. Reported wave heights are 78cm in Vanuatu, 47cm at Norfolk Island, 29cm in New Caledonia and 22cm at the North Cape in New Zealand. At time of writing no fatalities or building damage were reported. The Loyalty Islands region is seismically very active, 15 other earthquakes with magnitudes larger than 7 were detected over the preceding century. This seismic activity is related to the plate boundary between the Australian and the Pacific plate.
The earthquake was recorded at seismic stations worldwide, including stations of the Irish Nation Seismic Network (INSN), see seismic waveforms below.
Further information is available from the following sources:
https://www.emsc-csem.org/Earthquake/earthquake.php?id=947612
https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/us6000dg77
