On Wednesday morning, a huge earthquake struck off the east coast of Russia (near the Kamchatka Peninsula, 8.8 in size), and it sent tsunami warnings to places around the Pacific Ocean

Almost 2 million people in places like Russia, Japan, and Hawaii were told to evacuate. Warnings have been taken back now, but not all of them. There’s still a chance that waves as high as three meters could hit places like Chile, Costa Rica, and a few Pacific islands.

Japan recorded waves around 60 centimeters on its northern coast. Russia experienced flooding and waves up to almost 4 meters high near where the earthquake hit. In Hawaii, tsunami sirens sounded, warning people to evacuate to higher ground. In California, no one was to go to the beach area out of precaution. As of now, there have been no reports of injury, which is fortunate for such a huge earthquake.

Dr. Amy Gilligan, a seismologist from the University of Aberdeen, said there weren’t any major disasters because the earthquake didn’t happen near populated areas or cities. That gave people time to get alerted of the incoming dangers and leave before any waves appeared. She also points out that Japan’s buildings were built to withstand these types of earthquakes, which also helps.

Even though the situation seems under control now, people were lucky that the warnings got to them in time. In similar situations, there could have been many casualties.