Earthquake of 7.0 magnitude hits Japan near devastating 2011 disaster epicenter

A 7.0 preliminary magnitude earthquake has struck Japan off the coast of Ishinomaki, a city located just 65 miles (104 km) from Fukushima, the site of a devastating 9.0 magnitude quake 10 years ago.

Latest information from USGS shows the earthquake has a depth of 54 kilometers (34 miles). CNN teams in Tokyo felt the tremor.

A tsunami warning was issued earlier Saturday but has now been downgraded to a “tsunami forecast” of slight changes in sea level, a Japanese government website showed. The US Tsunami Warning System says there is no warning, advisory, watch or threat of tsunami associated with the Japan quake.

Firefighters in the Miyagi jurisdiction, where Ishinomaki is located, have reported no damage from the quake and nuclear reactors in eastern and northeastern Japan are secure, according to the Japan Times, an English-language Japanese daily newspaper.

Japan experienced a deadly quake a decade ago that caused the country’s worst nuclear disaster on record. More than 20,000 people died or went missing and a tsunami with 30-foot waves damaged several nuclear reactors in the area.

More than 100,000 people were evacuated and authorities have spent the past 10 years cleaning up the area — a massive effort that experts say will take decades to complete.

A powerful earthquake that hit Japan last month was an aftershock of the 2011 event, according to the national Meteorological Agency.