Communities along a 700-mile stretch of Alaska’s southern coast ordered their residents to higher ground after a powerful earthquake, but officials quickly downgraded and then canceled a tsunami warning in the area.

A major earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.2 has triggered a tsunami warning for the southern Alaska peninsula.

A lightly populated stretch of Alaska ’s southern coast was under a tsunami warning Wednesday after a strong earthquake was felt throughout the region, and officials in the Pacific Northwest were evaluating whether there was any threat to coastlines there. Early measurements put the quake’s magnitude at 7.3.