Sirens blaring across Hawaii urged residents to seek higher ground as the islands prepared for tsunami waves up to 2 meters high unleashed by a powerful earthquake in Canada, CNN reported on Sunday.
The waves between 3 and 7 feet were triggered by a sizable 7.7-magnitude earthquake that struck Canada's Pacific coastal province of British Columbia late on Saturday.
The tsunami “is expected to lash the islands, beginning about 10:28 p.m. local time Saturday (4:28 a.m. Sunday ET),” the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said.
"Basically this tsunami is pointed right at us," CNN quoted Gerard Fryer, senior geophysicist at the center, as saying.
The impact of the tsunami could last for hours.
Local television showed images of bumper-to-bumper traffic on roads leading from the coast to higher ground. Some 80,000 people live in evacuations zones in the island of Oahu, the island where Honolulu is located.
