This is the latest earthquake in a series of recent earthquakes in Japan.
The 6.1 magnitude earthquake occurred at 5:30 am on April 27 in the southern Hokkaido area, at a depth of about 80km, according to reports from the Japan Meteorological Agency and the US Geological Survey (USGS).
No tsunami warnings were issued, and the USGS predicted that property damage and life-threatening threats were minimal, due to the sparse population in the area about 200km east of Sapporo.
But "in areas with strong shaking, the risk of rock falls and landslides has increased," a Japanese Meteorological Agency official noted.
Hours earlier, a 5.0 magnitude earthquake occurred at sea a few hundred kilometers south of Hokkaido.
These earthquakes occurred less than a week after the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) warned of an increased risk of a super earthquake - magnitude 8.0 or higher - after the 7.7 magnitude earthquake on April 20 off Iwate prefecture.
The earthquake on April 20 injured 5 people, shaking large buildings in Tokyo, hundreds of kilometers from the epicenter. A 80cm high tsunami hit a port in Iwate, while smaller waves also hit other parts of northern Japan.
After that, the Japan Meteorological Agency warned, "the possibility of a new major earthquake is relatively higher than normal times".
Japan is one of the most seismic-active countries in the world, located on 4 large craters along the western edge of the Pacific "Fire Belt".
This archipelago, home to about 125 million people, usually records about 1,500 earthquakes per year and accounts for about 18% of earthquakes in the world.
Japan is still haunted by memories of the 9.0 magnitude underwater earthquake in 2011, which caused a tsunami that killed or missing about 18,500 people and led to a nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
