That's a big earthquake
If the initial estimate holds up, that's the biggest earthquake in almost exactly a year. The Chiapas quake in Mexico on September 8, 2017 was a magnitude 8.2.
That quake was about 80 km offshore and was the second-strongest in Mexico's history. It led to a tsunami with 1m-1.75m waves, killed at least 98 people and damaged about 41,000 homes.
Earthquakes above 8 only happen about once a year, globally.
Early reports on this earthquake suggest it was very deep at 669 km. That's extraordinarily deep. The Mexican earthquake was at 50km and the 9.2 magnitude tsunami in Japan came after an earthquake 30km deep.
The depth means the risks and damage is (hopefully) lower.
Keep an eye out for more earthquakes in the day ahead. There was a fairly big one in Japan early today. Seismic clusters are an effect where a rupture puts further strain on surrounding faults.
Here's a map of all the activity in the past 24 hours:
Update: It's been revised to a 7.8m quake.
