Tsunami threat after 7.6-magnitude earthquake strikes Panama
A 7.6-magnitude earthquake shook Panama on Friday morning, prompting tsunami warnings for coastal areas of Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala. The U.S. Geological Survey located the epicentre about 14 kilometres southwest of Pitaloza Arriba, near the country’s southern tip.
In Panama City, buildings swayed and people poured into the streets, but Omar Smith of the National Civil Protection Service told Telemetro Reporta that the main damage was in the central provinces of Veraguas, Herrera, and Los Santos. The capital, with its hundreds of skyscrapers, saw no reported damage. Aftershocks of magnitude 5.8 and 5.5 followed, and local media said the quake was felt in parts of neighbouring Colombia. President Jose Raul Mulino wrote on X that the event “should not be used to cause alarm or disorder” and urged calm. Panama lies on the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” a 40,000-kilometre zone of volcanoes and fault lines where most of the world’s earthquakes occur.
