181 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands

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

At this magnitude and depth, people at rest would likely notice it out to about 69 km (43 mi) from the epicentre. Estimated from magnitude, depth and distance with the intensity equation USGS Did You Feel It? uses; felt reports, where there are any, are the measurement.

How big was it?

This earthquake released about 4.8 tons of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 4.7 would have released about 32 times as much.

1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 35,000× the energy of this one
2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 1,600× the energy of this one
3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 1,100× the energy of this one
4. This earthquake M 3.7 about 4.8 tons of TNT
5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 10× 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.

For this area

The largest earthquake within 50 km since 2016 was M 5.0 on 2019-10-06 — about 86 times the energy of this one.

Before 2016, the USGS record since 1900 lists no earthquake of M5 or more within 50 km.

Since 2016: the QuakeIndex catalogue (US, M1.5+), built from the USGS FDSN event service. Before 2016: USGS ComCat, M5+ from 1900. Distances are between epicentres. This is the record, not a forecast.

Where

Epicentre 19.9790, -64.8216. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Aftershocks so far

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

1. 3.9 156 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 19:05 UTC
2. 3.7 139 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 02:41 UTC
3. 3.8 164 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 20:28 UTC
4. 3.7 133 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 16:57 UTC
5. 3.7 175 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 00:27 UTC
6. 3.8 152 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 17:58 UTC
7. 4.0 172 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 00:57 UTC
8. 3.9 152 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 03:55 UTC
9. 4.0 152 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 23:51 UTC
10. 4.0 154 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 06:40 UTC
11. 3.7 154 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 06:28 UTC
12. 3.6 165 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 08:24 UTC
13. 3.9 163 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 08:09 UTC
14. 3.6 153 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 20:43 UTC
15. 3.9 149 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:59 UTC

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of 22:13 UTC. QuakeIndex does not forecast aftershocks. When USGS issues an operational aftershock forecast it appears on the USGS event page.

On USGS

• The official USGS event page — the source of record for every value above
• Did you feel it? Report it to USGS — reports go to USGS, not to us
• ShakeMap for this event, when USGS has produced one

QuakeIndex does not issue warnings. For earthquake early warning see ShakeAlert.