QuakeIndex

Earthquake · reviewed by a seismologist

M 2.3ml

5km WNW of Desert Hot Springs, CA

· 10 km deep · released about 85 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Riverside County 58 kmSan Bernardino County 103 kmSan Diego County 108 kmOrange County 119 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 2.3 (ml)
Depth
10 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Riverside County, 58 km ESE
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 1645 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 85 lb of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 3.3 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 180,000× the energy of this one
  2. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 130,000× the energy of this one
  3. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 11× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 2.3 about 85 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 33.9803, -116.5473. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Riverside County, CA 58 km (36 mi) WNW of here earthquakes near Riverside County
San Bernardino County, CA 103 km (64 mi) SSW of here earthquakes near San Bernardino County
San Diego County, CA 108 km (67 mi) N of here earthquakes near San Diego County
Orange County, CA 119 km (74 mi) ENE of here earthquakes near Orange County
Imperial County, CA 152 km (94 mi) NW of here earthquakes near Imperial County

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 2.0 16km N of Indio, CA
  2. 1.6 7km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  3. 1.8 8km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  4. 1.8 7km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  5. 1.5 7km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  6. 2.8 7km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  7. 1.6 8km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  8. 3.8 7km NE of Desert Hot Springs, CA
  9. 1.6 7km WNW of Anza, CA
  10. 1.5 4km SSE of Beaumont, CA
  11. 1.9 3km ESE of Valle Vista, CA
  12. 2.6 10km SW of Morongo Valley, CA
  13. 1.7 7km SE of Valle Vista, CA
  14. 1.5 7km SSE of Banning, CA
  15. 1.7 11km WNW of Garnet, 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 4.5 on 2018-05-08 — it released about 1,900 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.