4 minor quakes jolt Eastern Visayas

TACLOBAN CITY — Four minor earthquakes hit Eastern Visayas on Wednesday with two of these epicenters traced to Hernani town in Eastern Samar province.

The first earthquake was traced in San Vicente, a town in Northern Samar, monitoring by the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs) showed,

The said tremor was recorded to have occurred at 12:17 a.m. with a 2.9 magnitude.

The second was in Mondragon town, also in Northern Samar with a 2.1 magnitude at 6:41 am.

The third and fourth earth movements were felt in Hernani.

The town of more than 8,500 people first felt the tremor at 10:21 a.m. with a magnitude of 2.7.

After more than an hour or at 11:27 a.m., the town again was hit by a tremor with a magnitude of 4.9.

Carlo Gabora, Hernani tourism officer, said that the successive jolts were ‘minor’ and did not result in any damage.

“We felt the two earthquakes this morning but there was no damage reported due to these incidents. We were in our office and we just stayed inside,” he said.

The last earthquake was felt in Tacloban City, more than 130 km from Hernani.

The quake was felt in Tacloban City at intensity III.

Phivolcs reported that all four earthquakes were of tectonic in origin with no damage reported to areas that felt the jolts./lzb