CONCEPCION, CHILE - Three strong aftershocks struck central Chile early Friday, sending panicked residents rushing out of their homes and leveling more buildings in an area already hard hit by last week's huge earthquake.

A first magnitude 6.2 quake jolted people awake at 6:20 am (0920 GMT), just six days after a historic 8.8-quake and ensuing tsunami waves killed over 800 people and left some two million homeless, Chile's emergency management agency Onemi said, without locating the epicenter.

It was followed by a 6.8-magnitude tremor - the most powerful aftershock of more than 200 aftershock to rattle Chile since Saturday's huge quake and a 6.9-magnitude temblor that struck 87 minutes later - and another measuring 6.6 in magnitude.

The 6.8-temblor hit at 8:47 am (1147 GMT), at a depth of 30 kilometers (19 miles), just 30 kilometers from Chile's second-largest city Concepcion, already badly damaged by the monster quake last week, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS).

The follow-up aftershock of magnitude 6.6 struck at 8:51 am (1151 GMT) some 41 kilometers (25 miles) from Concepcion, according to the US monitoring agency.

USGS did not issue an alert for a destructive widespread tsunami.

'However, earthquakes of this size sometimes generate local tsunamis that can be destructive along coasts located within 100 kilometers (62 miles) of the earthquake epicenter,' it added.