Japanese officials also downgraded tsunami warnings in the southern half of the country as 1.9 million residents faced evacuation orders along its Pacific coast.

Two million people are told to evacuate in Japan after an 8.8 magnitude earthquake, one of the strongest ever, hits Russia's eastern coast.

Tsunami alerts have been issued for Hawaii, the U.S West Coast and Alaska as well as Japan the Philippines, Indonesia, Guam, Peru and the Galapagos Islands, and parts of China following a massive earthquake in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Russia.