SANTIAGO: Rescue teams hunted for survivors on Sunday after one of the largest earthquakes on record killed at least 300 people in Chile and sent giant waves roaring across the Pacific Ocean.
In an address to the nation on Saturday, President Michelle Bachelet said two million Chileans had been affected but, after touring the worst-hit areas by plane, she found it hard to spell out the magnitude of the disaster.
In Pics: Massive quake in Chile
"The power of nature has again struck our country," Bachelet said, declaring six of Chile's 15 regions "catastrophe zones" in the aftermath of the 8.8-magnitude quake.
Highways in the South American nation of 16 million were sliced to pieces, bridges imploded and buildings collapsed as the earthquake struck at pre-dawn hours Saturday some 325 kilometers (200 miles) southwest of the capital Santiago.
"This is a catastrophe of immense proportions, so it will be very difficult to give precise figures," Interior Minister Edmundo Perez Yoma said. Officials later said at least 300 people had been killed.
Waves well over two meters (seven feet) high crashed into the Chilean coast after the quake struck at 3:34 am (0634 GMT) and tore out into the Pacific, killing at least five people in the remote Robinson Crusoe islands.
In the Chilean port of Talcahuano, trawlers were sent shooting inland to the town square where they lay oddly marooned next to abandoned cars.
About 50 countries and territories along an arc stretching from New Zealand to Japan braced for giant waves, five years after the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster that killed more than 220,000 people.
More than 70,000 people fled vulnerable coastal areas of Japan Sunday as a tsunami slammed into the country's long Pacific coastline.
"Please do not approach the coast at any cost," Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said in nationally televised comments as Japan, one of the world's most quake-prone nations, went on its first major tsunami alert in 15 years.
The first tsunami wave, 30 centimetres (one foot) high, hit Nemuro on the northern island of Hokkaido in the early afternoon, the Meteorological Agency said.
The massive quake plunged much of Santiago into darkness, snapping power lines, severing communications. The international airport was closed after sustaining significant damage to the terminal.
Many Chileans were still in nightclubs partying at the start of the weekend when the quake struck before dawn, ripping up roads, bringing roofs crashing down and toppling power lines.
"It was the worst experience of my life," said 22-year-old Sebastian, standing outside his house in eastern Santiago.
"Friends who were at clubs said it was pandemonium," said Santiago resident Maren Andrea Jimenez, an American expert working for the United Nations. "It was scary! Plaster began falling from the ceiling."
President Barack Obama said the United States "stands ready to assist in the rescue and recovery efforts, and we have resources that are positioned to deploy should the Chilean government ask for our help."
"Early indications are that hundreds of lives have been lost in Chile and damage is severe. On behalf of the American people, Michelle and I send our deepest condolences to the Chilean people," he said at the White House.
The total value of economic damage caused by the quake is likely to range between 15 billion and 30 billion dollars, a US risk modeling firm predicted.
Despite officials saying up to 1.5 million homes could be affected, Chile's Foreign Minister Mariano Fernandez asked countries that had offered aid to hold off until local authorities could assess the emergency needs.
Chile does not want "aid from anywhere to be a distraction" from disaster relief, Fernandez said, adding: "Any aid that arrives without having been determined to be needed really helps very little."
The European Union said it would provide three million euros (four million dollars) in immediate assistance. Unlike Haiti, struck by a devastating earthquake last month, Chile is one of Latin America's wealthiest countries.
The US Geological Survey said it had recorded more than 51 aftershocks ranging from 4.9 to 6.9 since the quake.
Earthquake-prone Chile lies along the Pacific rim of fire and is regularly rocked by quakes, but damage is often limited as they mostly hit in remote desert regions.
It was the second major earthquake to hit the Western hemisphere in seven weeks after more than 200,000 people were killed in Haiti last month by a 7.0-magnitude quake.
The epicentre was just a few hundred miles north of the biggest earthquake on record, a 9.5-magnitude monster in May 1960 that killed between 2,200 and 5,700 people and triggered a huge tsunami that reached as far as eastern New Zealand.
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