Strong M 6.5 earthquake offshore Guatemala

Strong earthquake initially registered as M 6.2, but later revised to 6.5, struck near coast of Guatemala at 22:15 UTC on November 11, 2012 according to USGS. The epicenter was  near Mexico-Guatemala border, 40 km (25 miles) SSE from Suchiate, Chiapas, Mexico and 60 km (37 miles) SW (232°) from Retalhuleu, Guatemala, only 180 km (112 miles) WSW (255°) from capital, Guatemala City (14.206°N, 92.125°W). The depth of epicenter was 27 km (16.8 miles).

EMSC recorded the same magnitude but with deeper epicenter, at 68 km (2 miles) and PTWC initialy  registered M 6.6 at depth of  30 km (19 miles) but was revised to M 6.2 shortly after.

Recent activity (Source: USGS)

There were no tsunami warnings or watches issued at the moment.

TSUNAMI BULLETIN NUMBER 001 PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER/NOAA/NWS ISSUED AT 2224Z 11 NOV 2012

NO DESTRUCTIVE WIDESPREAD TSUNAMI THREAT EXISTS BASED ON

HISTORICAL EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI DATA.



HOWEVER - EARTHQUAKES OF THIS SIZE SOMETIMES GENERATE LOCAL

TSUNAMIS THAT CAN BE DESTRUCTIVE ALONG COASTS LOCATED WITHIN

A HUNDRED KILOMETERS OF THE EARTHQUAKE EPICENTER. AUTHORITIES

IN THE REGION OF THE EPICENTER SHOULD BE AWARE OF THIS

POSSIBILITY AND TAKE APPROPRIATE ACTION.

This earthquake is the aftershock of massive M 7.4 earthquake that struck the same area few days ago, on November 7. Already damaged infrastructure and unstable buildings probably experienced some additional damage. USGS has calculated the intensities – 5000 people will have felt a very strong MMI VII shaking – 434000 people a  strong MMIVI shaking and  more than 2 million a moderate shaking. At least 15 million people felt the earthquake in Mexico, Nicaragua and Guatemala.

Featured image: USGS Shake Map