Strong mag. 5.7 earthquake - Coral Sea, 463 km northwest of Port Vila, Shefa Province, Vanuatu, on Monday, 12 October 2009 at 20:59 (GMT)

Strong mag. 5.7 earthquake - Coral Sea, 463 km northwest of Port Vila, Shefa Province, Vanuatu, on Monday, 12 October 2009 at 20:59 (GMT)

Strong magnitude 5.7 earthquake at 35 km depth

Date & time: 12 Oct 2009 20:59:38 UTC
Magnitude: 5.7
Depth: 35.0 km
Epicenter latitude / longitude: 14.075°S / 166.253°E (Coral Sea, Vanuatu)
Nearest volcano: Ureparapara (130 km / 81 mi)
Nearby towns and cities:
139 km (86 mi) NW of Port-Olry (pop: 1,950) --> See nearby quakes!
142 km (88 mi) W of Sola (pop: 1,170) --> See nearby quakes!
188 km (117 mi) NNW of Luganville (pop: 13,400) --> See nearby quakes!
253 km (157 mi) NNW of Norsup (pop: 3,000) --> See nearby quakes!
376 km (234 mi) S of Lata (Santa Cruz Islands, Solomon Islands) (pop: 553) --> See nearby quakes!
463 km (288 mi) NNW of Port Vila (pop: 35,900) --> See nearby quakes!
Primary data source: USGS (United States Geological Survey)
Estimated released energy: 2.2 x 1013 joules (6.22 gigawatt hours, equivalent to 5351 tons of TNT or 0.3 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 5.735 kmVanuatuUSGS
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

More info
Recorded aftershocks, latest first (2 quakes):
  • 23 Oct 2009 21:38 UTC
    | M 4.5 |
    42.4 km (26.3 mi) depth
    |
    33 km (20 mi) distance
    | USGS | Details
  • 12 Oct 2009 21:02 UTC
    | M 4.5 |
    35 km (21.7 mi) depth
    |
    30 km (18 mi) distance
    | USGS | Details

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Earlier earthquakes in the same area

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