One woman was killed when a house collapsed in southern Cagayan de Oro city, on the island of Mindanao.
The 7.6 magnitude quake struck at 8:47 p.m. local time on August 31 beneath the Pacific about 400 miles southeast of Manila, just off Eastern Samar province.
Shaking was felt as far away as the capital, and even locations about 100 miles farther northwest of the epicenter.
The jolt prompted a regional tsunami alert, but sea level rises of only about one foot were reported off Siargo Island. But many residents rushed to higher ground in fear of a major surge of ocean water.
Several aftershocks of lesser magnitude occurred over the weekend without any significant impact.
The Philippines is located in the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” where earthquakes and volcanic activity are common. A magnitude-7.7 quake in 1990 killed approximately 2,000 people in northern Luzon Island.