QuakeIndex

Earthquake · reviewed by a seismologist

M 1.8ml

22km SSW of Seal Beach, CA

· 2.1 km deep · released about 15 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Orange County 40 kmLos Angeles County 72 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 1.8 (ml)
Depth
2.1 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Orange County, 40 km ENE
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 1712 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 15 lb of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 2.8 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 1,000,000× the energy of this one
  2. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 710,000× the energy of this one
  3. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 63× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 1.8 about 15 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 33.5525, -118.1805. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Orange County, CA 40 km (25 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Orange County
Los Angeles County, CA 72 km (45 mi) S of here earthquakes near Los Angeles County
Ventura County, CA 126 km (78 mi) SE of here earthquakes near Ventura County

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 2.1 4km S of Huntington Beach, CA
  2. 1.9 4km N of Fountain Valley, CA
  3. 1.7 5km WNW of Huntington Beach, CA
  4. 2.3 17km SSE of San Pedro, CA
  5. 1.6 17km SSE of San Pedro, CA
  6. 1.5 4km ENE of Hawthorne, CA
  7. 2.0 4km N of Gardena, CA
  8. 1.7 4km ESE of Lennox, CA
  9. 1.7 4km ESE of Lennox, CA
  10. 1.7 3km N of Gardena, CA
  11. 1.8 4km N of Gardena, CA
  12. 2.0 3km ESE of Villa Park, CA
  13. 2.1 21km SSW of San Pedro, CA
  14. 1.5 3km ESE of Carson, CA
  15. 1.5 2km NE of La Habra, 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 4.3 on 2021-09-18 — it released about 5,200 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.