6.9-magnitude earthquake hit New Caledonia

The quake struck 261 kilometres (162 miles) east-southeast of the town of Tadine on the island of Mare at 11:19 pm local time (1219 GMT) at a relatively shallow depth of 15 kilometres, the US Geological Survey said.Geoscience Australia gave it an initial magnitude of 6.7 at a depth of 46 kilometres and estimated that it was unlikely to have caused damage.There was no threat of a widespread destructive tsunami from the tremor, which hit about 400 kilometres east of the New Caledonian capital Noumea, the Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said.However earthquakes of this size sometimes generate local tsunamis that can be destructive along coasts located within a hundred kilometres of the earthquake epicentre, it said.There were no immediate reports of damage or casualties from the sparsely populated and remote Loyalty Islands.New Caledonia lies on the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, a zone of frequent seismic activity caused by friction between shifting tectonic plates.