The Japan Meteorological Agency says it will investigate whether a quake intensity gauge overrated a tremor late on Saturday night in a town in Ishikawa Prefecture.

An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 4.3 struck just off the prefecture at around 11:20 p.m.

The agency says an intensity gauge in Shika Town registered lower 6 on the Japanese scale of zero to 7. That was prominently higher than an intensity of 3 recorded in other nearby areas.

A security guard at Shika town hall said that the tremor wasn't very strong. Police and the local fire department said they have received no reports of damage.

The Meteorological Agency held a news conference after the quake.
Agency official Kamaya Noriko said the patterns of the seismic waves indicate there was no abnormality in observation data.

She added that the tremor registered 1,492 Gal, far larger than 891 Gal recorded during the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake. Gal is a unit of acceleration that indicates the intensity of the ground's shaking.

Kamaya said people may not have felt major quake motions, because the jolt was instantaneous. She suggested that the intensity gauge in Shika Town may have been the only one that recorded a lower 6, due to the device's proximity to the epicenter.

Intensity levels do not usually vary greatly within a given area. The agency plans to send officials to Shika Town on Sunday to check whether its intensity gauge is functioning properly.