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

This was a light earthquake. It is usually felt clearly nearby and can rattle windows and dishes, but damage is uncommon.

At this magnitude and depth, people at rest would likely notice it out to about 180 km (112 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 340 tons of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 5.9 would have released about 32 times as much.

1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 500× the energy of this one
2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 22× the energy of this one
3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 16× the energy of this one
4. This earthquake M 4.9 about 340 tons of TNT
5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 710× 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 1.4 times the energy of this one.

Before 2016, the USGS record lists 16 earthquakes of M5 or more within 50 km; the five largest:

1. 6.1 91 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 9 km SE of this epicentre Oct 11, 2008
2. 6.0 112 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands · 16 km NNW of this epicentre Oct 17, 2001
3. 5.9 68 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 36 km SE of this epicentre Jun 25, 1930
4. 5.9 65 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 50 km SE of this epicentre Jun 26, 1985
5. 5.7 80 km NNE of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands · 40 km ESE of this epicentre Aug 2, 1927

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 19.2161, -64.8965. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

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

Aftershocks so far

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

1. 3.2 75 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:42 UTC
2. 3.9 88 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:35 UTC
3. 3.0 110 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:29 UTC
4. 2.6 102 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:29 UTC
5. 3.2 79 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:21 UTC
6. 4.3 101 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 12:09 UTC
7. 3.3 86 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 05:21 UTC
8. 3.4 78 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 05:19 UTC
9. 3.1 98 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 05:15 UTC
10. 3.4 95 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 04:45 UTC
11. 3.4 87 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 04:15 UTC
12. 3.1 108 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 03:02 UTC
13. 2.9 116 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 00:30 UTC
14. 3.6 94 km N of Cruz Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands 23:34 UTC
15. 3.3 103 km N of Charlotte Amalie, U.S. Virgin Islands 18:13 UTC

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of 17:53 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.