29 km W of Preston, Nevada

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 104 km (65 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 21 tons of TNT. Magnitude is logarithmic: each whole step up releases about 32 times more energy, so a magnitude 5.1 would have released about 32 times as much.

1. Northridge, California 1994 M 6.7 7,900× the energy of this one
2. Mineral, Virginia 2011 M 5.8 350× the energy of this one
3. Magna, Utah 2020 M 5.7 250× the energy of this one
4. This earthquake M 4.1 about 21 tons of TNT
5. Around the size people start to feel M 3.0 this one released 45× 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 4.8 on 2026-09-27 — about 11 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 38.9297, -115.3995. Map © OpenStreetMap contributors.

Nearby places

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

Aftershocks so far

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

1. 2.8 21 km W of Preston, Nevada 22:56 UTC
2. 2.2 18 km W of Preston, Nevada 15:36 UTC
3. 3.5 21 km W of Preston, Nevada 13:55 UTC
4. 2.8 39 km WNW of Preston, Nevada 21:34 UTC
5. 2.4 23 km WNW of Preston, Nevada 06:40 UTC
6. 3.4 19 km W of Preston, Nevada 22:55 UTC
7. 2.4 19 km W of Preston, Nevada 16:37 UTC
8. 2.5 20 km WNW of Preston, Nevada 17:06 UTC
9. 2.7 18 km W of Preston, Nevada 11:31 UTC
10. 1.8 21 km W of Preston, Nevada 22:03 UTC
11. 3.3 19 km W of Preston, Nevada 20:16 UTC
12. 2.8 18 km W of Preston, Nevada 17:43 UTC
13. 3.5 25 km WNW of Preston, Nevada 15:34 UTC
14. 2.2 24 km W of Preston, Nevada 18:49 UTC
15. 2.0 26 km WNW of Preston, Nevada 06:34 UTC

Counted from the QuakeIndex database, which ingests the USGS feed every 30 seconds · as of 06:12 UTC. QuakeIndex does not forecast aftershocks. When USGS issues an operational aftershock forecast it appears on the USGS event page.

Revisions

USGS refines a solution as more stations report. Every change we have seen is listed here.

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.