One of the most powerful earthquakes ever recorded has sent a tsunami crashing into a Russian port and smaller waves barreling across the Pacific to the Americas and south to New Zealand.

A powerful magnitude 8.8 earthquake off Russia's far-eastern Kamchatka Peninsula Tuesday triggered tsunami waves across the Pacific Ocean. Russia said the shallow quake caused damage in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and elsewhere on the peninsula and flooded the Kuril Islands with waves as high as 19 feet.

An 8.8-magnitude earthquake off Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula shook the Pacific, but its tsunami fizzled. A geologist explains why.