"The 4.3 magnitude earthquake was registered at 10:14 a.m. [23:14 on Thursday GMT]. Its epicenter was located … 288 kilometers [over 178 miles] southeast of the Island of Simushir. The epicenter laid at a depth of 31 kilometers," a head of the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk seismological station said.
The head of the station added that residents of the Kuril Islands had not felt the tremor.
The Kuril Islands are located in a seismically active zone known as the Ring of Fire, which is regularly affected by powerful earthquakes. On 5 November 1952, the 9.0 magnitude earthquake triggered a huge tsunami that devastated the town of Severo-Kurilsk, leaving more than 2,300 people killed.