120 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 75 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 7.8 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 5.8 970× the energy of this one
3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 680× the energy of this one
4. This earthquake M 3.8 about 7.8 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 2021-02-06 — about 59 times the energy of this one.

Before 2016, the USGS record lists 12 earthquakes of M5 or more within 50 km; the five largest:

1. 6.1 91 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 35 km SSE of this epicentre Oct 11, 2008
2. 6.0 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 11 km SE of this epicentre Oct 17, 2001
3. 5.6 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 14 km SE of this epicentre Oct 16, 2001
4. 5.3 97 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 45 km SE of this epicentre Dec 19, 2007
5. 5.2 99 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 41 km SE 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 19.4325, -64.9961. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

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

Aftershocks so far

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

1. 3.5 85 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 16:56 UTC
2. 3.4 82 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 14:56 UTC
3. 3.3 94 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 13:54 UTC
4. 3.4 83 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 13:19 UTC
5. 3.6 78 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:46 UTC
6. 4.9 82 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:23 UTC
7. 3.7 111 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 05:00 UTC
8. 3.5 103 km N of Culebra, Puerto Rico 07:42 UTC
9. 3.8 99 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 20:57 UTC
10. 3.8 101 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:59 UTC
11. 3.7 101 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 19:58 UTC
12. 3.6 106 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 19:43 UTC
13. 3.5 95 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 04:13 UTC
14. 3.8 107 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 18:52 UTC
15. 3.6 91 km N of Culebra, Puerto Rico 11:53 UTC

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of 20:39 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.