The eruption occurred after a huge earthquake struck Russia’s Far East early Wednesday, an 8.8-magnitude temblor that caused small tsunami waves in Japan and Alaska and prompted warnings for Hawaii, North and Central America and Pacific islands south toward New Zealand.

The shallow tremor off the Kamchatka Peninsula damaged buildings and injured several people in the remote Russian region, while much of Japan's eastern seaboard − devastated by a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami in 2011 − was ordered to evacuate, as were parts of Hawaii.