QuakeIndex

Earthquake · reviewed by a seismologist

M 3.4md

43 km SW of Pole Ojea, Puerto Rico

· 20 km deep · released about 1.7 tons of TNT

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10 km30 km60 km120 km N Cabo Rojo Municipio 46 kmMayagüez Municipio 56 kmLajas Municipio 57 kmHormigueros Municipio 61 kmSan Germán Municipio 65 kmGuánica Municipio 67 kmSabana Grande Municipio 71 kmRincón Municipio 73 kmAñasco Municipio 74 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 3.4 (md)
Depth
20 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Cabo Rojo Municipio, 46 km NE
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 2262 days ago

This was a small earthquake. Shaking like this is often felt indoors nearby and very rarely causes damage.

How big was it?

This earthquake released about 1.7 tons of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 4.4 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 99,000× the energy of this one
  2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 4,400× the energy of this one
  3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 3,100× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 3.4 about 1.7 tons of TNT
  5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 3.6× more

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 17.7298, -67.5111. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Cabo Rojo Municipio, PR 46 km (29 mi) SW of here earthquakes near Cabo Rojo Municipio
Mayagüez Municipio, PR 56 km (35 mi) SE of here earthquakes near Mayagüez Municipio
Lajas Municipio, PR 57 km (35 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Lajas Municipio
Hormigueros Municipio, PR 61 km (38 mi) SW of here earthquakes near Hormigueros Municipio
San Germán Municipio, PR 65 km (41 mi) SW of here earthquakes near San Germán Municipio
Guánica Municipio, PR 67 km (42 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Guánica Municipio

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 2.9 7 km WSW of La Parguera, Puerto Rico
  2. 3.0 6 km WSW of La Parguera, 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 4.3 on 2019-09-05 — it released about 25 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.