Strong mag. 6.2 earthquake - North Pacific Ocean, 57 km west of Liberia, Provincia de Guanacaste, Costa Rica, on Sunday, October 4, 1987 at 08:15 (GMT)

Strong mag. 6.2 earthquake - North Pacific Ocean, 57 km west of Liberia, Provincia de Guanacaste, Costa Rica, on Sunday, October 4, 1987 at 08:15 (GMT)

Strong magnitude 6.2 earthquake at 48 km depth

1 Jan 00:00 UTC: First to report: USGS after 30 seconds.
Date & time: Oct 4, 1987 08:15:18 UTC
Magnitude: 6.2
Depth: 47.9 km
Epicenter latitude / longitude: 10.823°N / 85.926°W (North Pacific Ocean, Costa Rica)
Antipode: 10.823°S / 94.074°E
Nearest volcano: Orosí (52 km / 32 mi)
Nearby towns and cities:
42 km (26 mi) SW of La Cruz (pop: 4,320) --> See nearby quakes!
46 km (28 mi) NW of Sardinal (pop: 3,270) --> See nearby quakes!
57 km (36 mi) WNW of Liberia (pop: 45,400) --> See nearby quakes!
73 km (45 mi) NNW of Santa Cruz (pop: 12,300) --> See nearby quakes!
87 km (54 mi) W of San Jose (Upala) (pop: 31,400) --> See nearby quakes!
91 km (57 mi) NW of Nicoya (pop: 15,300) --> See nearby quakes!
150 km (93 mi) SSE of Managua (Nicaragua) (pop: 973,100) --> See nearby quakes!
152 km (94 mi) NW of Puntarenas (pop: 35,700) --> See nearby quakes!
217 km (135 mi) WNW of San Francisco (pop: 55,900) --> See nearby quakes!
225 km (140 mi) WNW of San Jose (pop: 335,000) --> See nearby quakes!
Primary data source: USGS (United States Geological Survey)
Estimated released energy: 1.3 x 1014 joules (35 gigawatt hours, equivalent to 30089 tons of TNT or 1.9 atomic bombs!) | about seismic energy
Show interactive Map
[smaller] [bigger]
If you felt this quake (or if you were near the epicenter), please share your experience and submit a short "I felt it" report! Other users would love to hear about it!
If you did NOT feel the quake although you were in the area, please report it! Your contribution is valuable to earthquake science, seismic hazard analysis and mitigation efforts. You can use your device location or the map to indicate where you were during the earthquake. Thank you!

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.
Mag.DepthLocationSource
6.248 kmCosta RicaUSGS
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.
Volcanoes & Earthquakes - new app for Android

Aftershocks

[More info]

Recorded aftershocks, latest first (3 quakes)

Date and timeMag
Depth		LocationDetails
Oct 28, 1987 19:16
34 years ago
4.1

33 km		La Cruz, 62 km N of Liberia, Provincia de Guanacaste, Costa RicaMore
Oct 26, 1987 05:45
34 years ago
4.1

10 km		North Pacific Ocean, 106 km W of Liberia, Provincia de Guanacaste, Costa RicaMore
Oct 4, 1987 19:15
34 years ago
4.4

64 km		North Pacific Ocean, 75 km SW of Liberia, Provincia de Guanacaste, Costa RicaMore

Earlier earthquakes in the same area

Try our free app!
Volcanoes & Earthquakes - new app for Android
Android | iOS version
Why is there advertising on this site?
Support us - Help us upgrade our services!
We truly love working to bring you the latest volcano and earthquake data from around the world. Maintaining our website and our free apps does require, however, considerable time and resources.
We need financing to increase hard- and software capacity as well as support our editor team. We're aiming to achieve uninterrupted service wherever an earthquake or volcano eruption unfolds, and your donations can make it happen! Every donation will be highly appreciated. If you find the information useful and would like to support our team in integrating further features, write great content, and in upgrading our soft- and hardware, please make a donation (PayPal or Online credit card payment).

Planned features:
  • Improved multilanguage support
  • Tsunami alerts
  • Faster responsiveness
Thanks to your past donations, these features have been added recently:
  • Earthquake archive from 1900 onwards
  • Detailed quake stats
  • Additional seismic data sources
Download and Upgrade the Volcanoes & Earthquakes app to get one of the fastest seismic and volcano alerts online:
Android | IOS
Thank you!
Copyrights: VolcanoDiscovery and other sources as noted.
Use of material: Most texts and images, in particular photographs, on this website are protected by copyright. Further reproduction and use of without authorization is usually not consented. If you are not sure or need licensing rights for photographs, for example for publications and commercial use, please contact us.