Very strong mag. 6.3 earthquake - South Pacific Ocean, 110 km southeast of Nuku\'alofa, Tongatapu, on Thursday, 31 October 1963 at 03:17 (GMT)

Very strong mag. 6.3 earthquake - South Pacific Ocean, 110 km southeast of Nuku\'alofa, Tongatapu, on Thursday, 31 October 1963 at 03:17 (GMT)

Very strong magnitude 6.3 earthquake at 17 km depth

Date & time: 31 Oct 1963 03:17:42 UTC
Magnitude: 6.3
Depth: 16.5 km
Epicenter latitude / longitude: 22.05°S / 174.797°W (South Pacific Ocean, Tonga)
Nearest volcano: Unnamed 21.38°S/175.65°W (115 km / 71 mi)
Nearby towns and cities:
81 km (50 mi) SSE of ‘Ohonua (Ohonua) (pop: 1,240) --> See nearby quakes!
106 km (66 mi) SSE of Kolonga (pop: 1,100) --> See nearby quakes!
110 km (68 mi) SSE of Nuku'alofa (pop: 22,400) --> See nearby quakes!
110 km (68 mi) SSE of Nuku‘alofa (pop: 22,400) --> See nearby quakes!
253 km (157 mi) S of Pangai (pop: 1,740) --> See nearby quakes!
387 km (241 mi) SSW of Neiafu (pop: 4,320) --> See nearby quakes!
Primary data source: USGS (United States Geological Survey)
Estimated released energy: 1.8 x 1014 joules (49.4 gigawatt hours, equivalent to 42502 tons of TNT or 2.7 atomic bombs!) More info
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Data for the same earthquake reported by different agencies

Info: The more agencies report about the same quake and post similar data, the more confidence you can have in the data. It takes normally up to a few hours until earthquake parameters are calculated with near-optimum precision.
MagnitudeDepthLocationSource
M 6.317 kmTonga regionUSGS
Note: for quakes of 2012 and earlier, our database often contains only records from USGS.

User reports for this quake

User reports estimate the perceived ground shaking intensity according to the MMI (Modified Mercalli Intensity) scale.
There are no user reports for this quake yet. If you felt it be the first to report it!
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Aftershocks

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Recorded aftershocks, latest first (2 quakes):
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Earlier earthquakes in the same area

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