138 km N of Cruz Bay, 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 76 km (47 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 7.6 tons of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 4.8 would have released about 32 times as much.

1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 22,000× the energy of this one
2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 1,000× the energy of this one
3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 710× the energy of this one
4. This earthquake M 3.8 about 7.6 tons of TNT
5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 16× 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 55 times the energy of this one.

Before 2016, the USGS record lists 11 earthquakes of M5 or more within 50 km; the five largest:

1. 6.2 131 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 16 km SE of this epicentre Sep 6, 1919
2. 6.0 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 40 km SW of this epicentre Oct 17, 2001
3. 5.6 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 37 km SW of this epicentre Oct 16, 2001
4. 5.3 97 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 42 km S of this epicentre Dec 19, 2007
5. 5.2 99 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 39 km S of this epicentre Dec 28, 2007

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 19.5725, -64.6235. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Aftershocks so far

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

1. 3.2 98 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 18:12 UTC
2. 3.4 117 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 17:47 UTC
3. 3.1 104 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 17:18 UTC
4. 3.8 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 17:02 UTC
5. 3.8 105 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 22:40 UTC
6. 3.0 94 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 22:40 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. 3.8 104 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 02:18 UTC
10. 3.9 101 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 07:19 UTC
11. 3.3 102 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 18:35 UTC
12. 3.9 114 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 13:59 UTC
13. 4.0 152 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 23:51 UTC
14. 4.0 154 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 06:40 UTC
15. 3.7 154 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 06:28 UTC

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of 16:53 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.