Mexico's biggest earthquake in a century triggers a tsunami
At least six have been killed including two children after a massive 8.1 earthquake struck off the south coast of Mexico triggering a tsunami experts fear could reach three metres high.
The earthquake was felt across Mexico, toppling houses, shaking buildings in the country's capital and leaving a million without power amid reports tremors were detected as a far away as Austin, Texas - more than 1,300 miles from the epicentre.
A small 3.3ft tsunami has already been detected in Mexico after the quake struck at 11.49pm last night, 76 miles southwest of the town of Pijijiapan, at a depth of 43 miles. But Seismologists at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said it could grow to 12ft.
Terrified residents in Mexico City ran out into the streets after the quake struck, witnesses said. Tremors were the strongest in a hundred years, according to President Enrique Pena Nieto - greater even than a devastating earthquake in 1985 that hit the capital flattening swathes of the city and killing thousands.
The US Tsunami Warning System said widespread hazardous tsunami waves were possible within the next three hours on the Pacific coasts of several central American countries - Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Panama, Ecuador and Honduras.
As far as 8,700 miles away in the Philippines, the national disaster agency put the country's entire eastern seaboard on alert.
Rescuers in southern Mexico are already battling to remove rubble from collapsed buildings after the earthquake struck
Preparations: A hospital evacuated its patients and staff in Puebla after the earthquake struck amid reports at least six people have been killed
Buildings have collapsed and emergency crews have been working through the night after the 8.1 magnitude quake struck
Emergency: This was the scene after patients and doctors fled from a hospital in Mexico City as the earthquake struck
People ran into the street in the Tlatelolco neigbourhood of Mexico City as the powerful 8.1 magnitude earthquake struck
Aftermath: This was the scene in a shopping centre in Mexico after it was violently shaken by the earthquake overnight
Patients and doctors wait outside a hospital in Villahermosa, Mexico, after the earthquake shook the building overnight
A massive 8.1 earthquake has struck 60 miles off the coast of Mexico and was felt across the country
The only tsunami detected so far, however had a largest wave measured at 3.3ft, experts said.
The death toll has already risen to at least six people, including two children in Tabasco state.
Tabasco Gov. Arturo Nunez said that one of the children died when a wall collapsed, and the other was a baby who died in a children's hospital that lost electricity, cutting off the supply to the infant's ventilator.
The other three deaths were in Chiapas state, in San Cristobal de las Casas, with two crushed when buildings collapsed on them.
The quake hit offshore in the Pacific, the US Geological Survey said, putting the magnitude at 8.1.
culled : Dailymail
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