QuakeIndex

mining explosion · reviewed by a seismologist

M 3.1mb_lg

Tennessee-Virginia border region

· 0.0 km deep · released about 1,300 lb of TNT

Felt it? Tell USGS Check my area
10 km30 km60 km120 km N Harlan County 24 kmLee County 26 kmLetcher County 26 kmNorton city 30 kmWise County 31 kmScott County 37 kmLeslie County 44 kmPerry County 45 kmHancock County 48 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 3.1 (mb_lg)
Depth
0.0 km below the surface
Felt
no reports yet
Nearest
Harlan County, 24 km W
Status
Reviewed by a seismologist

USGS · last changed by USGS · we first saw it 1723 days ago

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

USGS catalogues this as mining explosion, not an earthquake.

How big was it?

This earthquake released about 1,300 lb of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 4.1 would have released about 32 times as much.

  1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 250,000× the energy of this one
  2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 11,000× the energy of this one
  3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 7,900× the energy of this one
  4. This earthquake M 3.1 about 1,300 lb of TNT
  5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 1.4× 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 36.8943, -82.9601. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

PlaceDistanceDirection
Harlan County, KY 24 km (15 mi) E of here earthquakes near Harlan County
Lee County, VA 26 km (16 mi) NE of here earthquakes near Lee County
Letcher County, KY 26 km (16 mi) SSW of here earthquakes near Letcher County
Norton city, VA 30 km (19 mi) W of here earthquakes near Norton city
Wise County, VA 31 km (20 mi) WSW of here earthquakes near Wise County
Scott County, VA 37 km (23 mi) WNW of here earthquakes near Scott County

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

Aftershocks so far

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

  1. 2.1 5 km NE of Clinchport, Virginia
  2. 2.7 18 km SSE of Hyden, Kentucky
  3. 2.2 9 km SSW of Cumberland, Kentucky
  4. 2.4 Kentucky-Tennessee border region
  5. 2.5 5 km SW of Benham, Kentucky
  6. 2.0 8 km SW of Cawood, Kentucky
  7. 2.5 6 km E of Sneedville, Tennessee

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.

On USGS

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