Quake near Guam sways buildings

GUAM (Reuters) - A strong earthquake swayed buildings on the Pacific island of Guam on Sunday but there were no immediate reports of damage and no tsunami alert was issued.

The magnitude 7.1 quake occurred at 12.09 p.m. local time near the U.S. territory, with its epicenter at a depth of 30 km, Japan's Meteorological Agency said on its Web site (www.jma.go.jp/en/quake).

Some residents said high-rise blocks swayed and goods fell off supermarket shelves. But two hours after the quake, local television had reported no damage to buildings on Guam, an island east of the Philippines which is home to a major U.S. military base.

"We felt it. It was swinging back and forth for a minute or two," said Patrick Chan, a Guam-based meteorologist at the U.S. National Weather Service. "It's not expected to cause a tsunami." The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, based in Hawaii, said in a statement there was "no destructive widespread tsunami threat". Neither Guam nor the Philippines issued tsunami warnings.

The U.S. Geological Survey also recorded a quake in the same area, which it said on its Web site (earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter) was of magnitude 6.8 and centered about 345 km (215 miles) south-southeast of Guam.