KOLKATA, 11 APRIL: Tremors felt in several districts of the state due to an earthquake, measuring 8.5 on the Richer scale, that hit off the western coast of northern Sumatra, triggered panic in the city and caused people to evacuate their workplaces and houses and come out on the streets. As office windows and doors started rattling, and several news channels flashed visuals of cracks in various buildings, people in the office areas of Park Street, Dharamtalla, Sector V in Salt Lake and BBD Bag, left their work and rushed out of their offices. “I was calling a customer when my chair shook.

Pointing to the rich biodiversity of the Andaman and Nicobar islands, a team of researchers from the city has identified a new species of earthworm.

Jaya Manazhy and Aja Manazhy, senior research scholars in the Department of Zoology, Mar Ivanios College, under the guidance of K. Vijayakumaran Nair, identified the species from samples collected from Port Blair by CSIR Emeritus scientist Oommen V. Oommen and Assistant Professor K. Ramachandran.

A magnitude 6.4 quake struck east of Andaman Islands and triggered a local tsunami warning, the US Geological Survey and Pacific Tsunami Warning Center reported on Tuesday.

The USGS said the quake struck at 1:21 a.m. on Tuesday (1951 GMT on Monday) 75 miles (120 km) east of Port Blair at a depth of 79.4 miles (127.7 km).

Port Blair bench allows resort that may endanger Jarawas THE Calcutta High Court has cleared the construction of a holiday resort near the forest area reserved for the threatened Jarawa tribe in South Andamans. The Andaman administration had appealed against building the resort saying it was within the five-kilometre buffer zone of the reserve and would endanger the tribe

Scientists begin work on vaccine in Port Blair scientists at the Regional Medical Research Centre (rmrc) of Andaman and Nicobar Islands are all set to begin work on developing a vaccine against Chikungunya, a viral infection that killed over 80 people in India in 2006.