QuakeIndex

Earthquake · automatic estimate, may change

M 2.1md

17 km NE of San Simeon, CA

· 5.2 km deep · released about 40 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Monterey County 54 kmSan Luis Obispo County 74 kmSan Benito County 92 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 2.1 (md)
Depth
5.2 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Monterey County, 54 km NNW
Status
Automatic — a machine’s first estimate, which may change

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 657 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 40 lb of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 3.1 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 380,000× the energy of this one
  2. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 270,000× the energy of this one
  3. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 24× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 2.1 about 40 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 35.7808, -121.1138. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Monterey County, CA 54 km (34 mi) SSE of here earthquakes near Monterey County
San Luis Obispo County, CA 74 km (46 mi) NW of here earthquakes near San Luis Obispo County
San Benito County, CA 92 km (57 mi) S of here earthquakes near San Benito County
Kings County, CA 121 km (75 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Kings County

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 1.9 8 km WNW of Atascadero, CA
  2. 1.7 15 km ENE of San Simeon, CA
  3. 2.2 30 km SSW of Lopez Point, CA
  4. 3.0 7 km WSW of Atascadero, CA
  5. 2.4 7 km WSW of Atascadero, CA
  6. 1.9 20 km NNW of San Simeon, CA
  7. 1.9 2 km ESE of Lopez Point, CA
  8. 1.7 24 km S of Lopez Point, CA
  9. 2.1 11 km NE of San Simeon, CA
  10. 1.6 18 km W of San Simeon, CA
  11. 1.5 20 km S of Lopez Point, CA
  12. 1.6 20 km S of Lopez Point, CA
  13. 1.6 2 km SSW of Lopez Point, CA
  14. 1.7 28 km N of San Simeon, CA
  15. 1.8 12 km W of Templeton, 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 4.7 on 2021-10-25 — it released about 7,200 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.