QuakeIndex

Earthquake · reviewed by a seismologist

M 1.5ml

3 km N of El Centro, CA

· 9.9 km deep · released about 5.4 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Imperial County 32 kmRiverside County 110 kmSan Diego County 116 km
Distance rings around the epicentre, with the nearest towns at their true direction and later quakes as coloured dots. Not a shaking map — see the USGS ShakeMap for that.
When
Magnitude
M 1.5 (ml)
Depth
9.9 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Imperial County, 32 km NE
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 950 days ago

This was a minor earthquake. Quakes this small are rarely felt and do not cause damage.

How big was it?

This earthquake released about 5.4 lb of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 2.5 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 2,800,000× the energy of this one
  2. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 2,000,000× the energy of this one
  3. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 180× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 1.5 about 5.4 lb of TNT

Energy from the Gutenberg–Richter relation (log10E = 1.5M + 4.8), rounded to two figures; bar length is magnitude, which is already a logarithm of energy. Magnitudes of past earthquakes from the USGS catalogue.

Where

Epicentre 32.8128, -115.5608. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Imperial County, CA 32 km (20 mi) SW of here earthquakes near Imperial County
Riverside County, CA 110 km (68 mi) SSE of here earthquakes near Riverside County
San Diego County, CA 116 km (72 mi) ESE of here earthquakes near San Diego County

Places and coordinates from the US Census Bureau Gazetteer (2024). Distances are from the epicentre.

Aftershocks so far

60 earthquakes have been recorded within 50 km since this one.

  1. 1.6 2 km NW of El Centro, CA
  2. 1.6 0 km NNE of El Centro, CA
  3. 1.7 0 km NNE of El Centro, CA
  4. 1.9 1 km NNW of El Centro, CA
  5. 1.6 0 km SSE of El Centro, CA
  6. 1.5 2 km WNW of El Centro, CA
  7. 1.8 0 km NNW of El Centro, CA
  8. 1.7 1 km NW of El Centro, CA
  9. 1.7 4 km SSW of Imperial, CA
  10. 1.7 3 km NNW of El Centro, CA
  11. 1.7 1 km NW of El Centro, CA
  12. 1.7 6 km WSW of Imperial, CA
  13. 2.8 3 km NNW of El Centro, CA
  14. 1.6 1 km WNW of El Centro, CA
  15. 2.4 1 km ENE of El Centro, CA

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of . QuakeIndex does not forecast aftershocks. When USGS issues an operational aftershock forecast it appears on the USGS event page.

For this area

The largest earthquake within 50 km in our catalogue was M 5.3 on 2021-06-05 — it released about 420,000 times the energy of this one.

From the QuakeIndex catalogue, built from the USGS FDSN event service.

On USGS

QuakeIndex does not issue warnings. For earthquake early warning see ShakeAlert.