US widens tsunami warning to most of Pacific

WASHINGTON: The US tsunami monitoring center on Friday widened a warning to virtually the entire Pacific coast, including Australia and South America, after a massive earthquake in Japan.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center expanded a previous alert to include the US state of Hawaii, Australia, New Zealand, and the entire coast of Central and South America.

The center had earlier said the tsunami would hit Hawaii at around 2:45 am (1245 GMT) and the US West Coast at 7:45 am (1545 GMT).