Earthquake of 8.3 magnitude strikes Chile, tsunami warning issued

There were no immediate reports of casualties, and coastal areas around Chile were being evacuated for fear of a tsunami.

The quake was felt as far as Buenos Aires, more than 1,200 kilometres away. Several buildings in the Argentinian capital were preventively evacuated.

Earlier, the Earthquake Institute of the University of Chile had measured the magnitude at 7.2 on the Richter scale, and it later updated it to 7.9. The Chilean National Quake Centre spoke of 8.4.

The US government geologists said the quake's centre was below the Pacific, 25 kilometres off the central Chilean town of Illapel, in the Coquimbo region, and 228 kilometres north-north-west of Santiago. The quake was 8 kilometres deep, according to the USGS.

Chilean government spokesman Marcelo Diaz called for "calm and tranquility" so the necessary measures could be adopted.

"We were in the office and we felt a very strong, very long quake,"Diaz was quoted as saying on the website of the daily El Mercurio.

"We expect that there will be aftershocks," he said.

The USGS reported at least four aftershocks with a magnitude above 6.

Santiago airport was preventively evacuated. The city's subway, however, remained operational.

The US National Weather Service (NWS) issued a tsunami watch for the US Pacific island state of Hawaii.

"A tsunami may have been generated by this earthquake that could be destructive on coastal areas even far from the epicentre," the NWS said in a public alert, adding that efforts to determine a possible threat to Hawaii were underway.

If a tsunami was generated by the earthquake, the earliest waves would arrive in Hawaii at 0306 local time (1306 GMT) Thursday, the NWS said.