The shallow quake hit 79 kilometres southeast of the village of Pangai. Photo: USGS
A tsunami warning has been lifted following a magnitude 7.0 earthquake in Tonga.
The shallow quake hit 79 kilometres southeast of the village of Pangai, with warnings also extending to the island nation of Niue, the US Geological Survey said.
"Tsunami waves reaching 0.3 to 1 meters above the tide level are possible for some coasts of Niue... and Tonga," The US tsunami warning system earlier said.
It had warned that "hazardous tsunami waves from this earthquake are possible within 300 kilometres of the epicentre along the coasts of Tonga".
The Tonga national disaster agency issued a warning to residents to stay away from beaches and shorelines.
"People living on the low lying coast areas please move to higher grounds or further in land," the Tonga National Disaster Risk Management Office wrote on Facebook.
A Kiwi living in Veitongo, Ben Maloney, said he woke up to his bed shaking.
"The windows were all rattling and the whole house was shaking quite bad," he said.
Earthquakes are common in Tonga, a low-lying archipelago home to around 100,000 people that straddles the seismic Ring of Fire.
The Ring of Fire is an arc of intense tectonic activity that stretches through Southeast Asia and across the Pacific basin.
- AFP/RNZ
