Japan mistakenly issues 9.9-magnitude quake alert after 6.9 tremor near Russia, retracts it within minutes

The Japan Meteorological Agency on Friday mistakenly sent out a 9.9-magnitude earthquake alert, reportedly after a 6.9 tremor hit Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula, later withdrawing the warning.

The false warning was issued on Friday afternoon (local time), and had forecast strong shaking across northern, eastern and central Japan, Japan Times reported. An early-warning display identified the location as the Kuril Islands region and showed an estimated magnitude of 9.9 at a depth of 140 kilometers (87 miles), BNO News reported.

The actual earthquake of 6.9 magnitude, centered off the Kamchatka Peninsula, had occurred at around 12:36 pm (local time). Following this, a warning was issued, setting off alarms on public speakers and mobile phones, according to the Japan Times.

The alert was mistakenly issued at approximately 12.36 pm in Japan and canceled at 12.48 pm, NHK reported. The false emergency warning had allegedly covered a large area from Hokkaido to the Tokai region. Retracting the alert within minutes, the JMA stated it had overestimated the magnitude of the quake.

The 6.9-magnitude quake did not produce any shaking in Japan and no tsunami warnings were issued after tremors. A magnitude 9.9 earthquake would be the largest ever recorded, exceeding the magnitude 9.5 quake that struck Chile in 1960, according to the USGS.

It would release approximately 32,000 times as much energy as the actual 6.9 magnitude quake which struck Kamchatka on Friday.

The EMSC had earlier calculated the magnitude of the quake as 7, but later updated it to 6.9. The epicenter was 146 km between south and south-west (SSW) of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky in Russia and 80 km between north and norht-east(NNE) of Ozernovskiy in Russia, EMSC said. No tsunami alert was issued in the immediate aftermath of the quake, with the US National Tsunami Warning Center saying there was no danger following the tremors.