Breaking: Indonesia Lifts Tsunami Warning Following 7.3-Magnitude Quake

Indonesia lifted a tsunami warning Tuesday night in the wake of a 7.3-magnitude earthquake that struck just west of the cost of northern Sumatra.

The country’s meteorological and geophysics agency – which typically warns of tsunamis for any earthquakes of at least 7 magnitude, stated that it detected no waves.

Reuters reported that the warnings had sent panicked residents out of their houses, perhaps remembering the monster tsunami from December 2004 which was created by a 9.1-magnitude quake in the same general area and eventually killed more than 230,000 people (half of them in the Banda Aceh region of Sumatra).

The latest quake struck about 260 miles southwest of Banda Aceh at a depth of about 18 miles, said the U.S. Geological Survey. No damage or casualties has yet been reported in the vicinity.

The quake was in the sea and a tsunami warning is in force, but so far we have no reports of casualties or damage, an Indonesian government official told Agence France-Presse.