QuakeIndex

Earthquake · reviewed by a seismologist

M 1.5md

3 km W of Palo Seco, Puerto Rico

· 21 km deep · released about 5.6 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Patillas Municipio 2 kmMaunabo Municipio 8 kmArroyo Municipio 9 kmYabucoa Municipio 13 kmSan Lorenzo Municipio 15 kmGuayama Municipio 18 kmCayey Municipio 22 kmLas Piedras Municipio 22 kmHumacao Municipio 24 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 (md)
Depth
21 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Patillas Municipio, 2 km WSW
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 2938 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 5.6 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 2,700,000× the energy of this one
  2. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 1,900,000× the energy of this one
  3. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 170× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 1.5 about 5.6 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 18.0085, -65.9688. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Patillas Municipio, PR 2 km (1 mi) ENE of here earthquakes near Patillas Municipio
Maunabo Municipio, PR 8 km (5 mi) W of here earthquakes near Maunabo Municipio
Arroyo Municipio, PR 9 km (5 mi) ENE of here earthquakes near Arroyo Municipio
Yabucoa Municipio, PR 13 km (8 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Yabucoa Municipio
San Lorenzo Municipio, PR 15 km (10 mi) S of here earthquakes near San Lorenzo Municipio
Guayama Municipio, PR 18 km (11 mi) ENE of here earthquakes near Guayama Municipio

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 2.0 5 km S of Salinas, Puerto Rico
  2. 2.5 4 km SW of Patillas, Puerto Rico
  3. 1.8 18 km ESE of El Negro, Puerto Rico
  4. 1.9 2 km N of Carolina, Puerto Rico
  5. 1.9 11 km S of Emajagua, Puerto Rico
  6. 2.0 7 km SE of Arroyo, Puerto Rico
  7. 2.1 4 km ESE of Palmarejo, Puerto Rico
  8. 2.0 Puerto Rico region
  9. 2.0 3 km SSW of Jauca, Puerto Rico
  10. 2.3 2 km SSW of Jauca, Puerto Rico
  11. 2.0 2 km SSW of Jauca, Puerto Rico
  12. 2.0 2 km SE of Santa Isabel, Puerto Rico
  13. 2.1 1 km SSE of G. L. Garcia, Puerto Rico
  14. 2.5 11 km S of Emajagua, Puerto Rico
  15. 1.9 2 km S of Las Ochenta, Puerto Rico

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 4.6 on 2016-12-05 — it released about 43,000 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.