TOKYO: A total of nine people were injured in a strong earthquake that struck western Japan on Wednesday night, local authorities said Thursday.

None of their injures were serious, according to the authorities. There have been no reports of death related to the temblor, which measured up to lower 6, the third-highest level on Japan’s seismic intensity scale.

In Ehime Prefecture, part of the Shikoku region, six people in municipalities including Matsuyama, Ehime’s capital, suffered injuries.

Two people were injured in Oita Prefecture, located in the Kyushu region. Of them, a man in his 80s in the city of Tsukumi, where the quake registered lower 5 on the seismic intensity scale, fell and injured his arm. One person was injured in Kochi Prefecture in Shikoku.

The earthquake occurred at a depth of about 39 kilometers in the Bungo Channel, which separates the Shikoku and Kyushu regions. It measured lower 6 in the Ehime town of Ainan and the Kochi city of Sukumo, and upper 5 in the Ehime city of Uwajima.

Jiji Press