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Motagua Fault (green line) and the Middle America Trench (pink line)

Earthquakes are relatively frequent occurrences in Guatemala.^[1] The country lies in a major fault zone known as the Motagua and Chixoy-Polochic fault complex, which cuts across Guatemala and forms the tectonic boundary between the Caribbean plate and the North American plate. In addition, along Guatemala's western coast line, the Cocos plate pushes against the Caribbean plate, forming a subduction zone known as the Middle America Trench located approximately 50 km off Guatemala's Pacific coast. This subduction zone led to the formation of the Central America Volcanic Arc, and is an important source of offshore earthquakes.^[2] Both these major tectonic processes have generated deformations within the Caribbean plate and produced secondary fault zones, like the Mixco, Jalpatagua, and Santa Catarina Pinula faults.^[3]

The most destructive earthquake in recent Guatemalan history was the 1976 quake with a magnitude of 7.5 M_w and a hypocenter depth of just 5 km. This shallow-focus earthquake, originating from the Motagua Fault, caused 23,000 fatalities, leaving 76,000 injured and causing widespread material damage. Surprisingly, the 7.9 M_w earthquake of 1942, though higher in magnitude, was much less destructive, in part because of its substantially deeper hypocenter depth of 60 km.^[4]

A number of earthquakes with low magnitudes caused major damage in very localized areas, which may in part be explained by their relatively shallow depth. This was the case with the 1985 Uspantán earthquake of 5.0 M_w with a depth of 5 km, which destroyed most buildings in the town of Uspantán, but caused little or no damage in the rest of the country.^[5]

Earthquakes

Guatemala is in constant earthquake activity. However, there are some earthquakes that are more notable due to the damage they have caused. Notable earthquakes in recent Guatemalan history include the following:^[4]

Date	Event	Location	Mag.	MMI	Deaths	Notes
1717-09-29	1717 Guatemala earthquake	Antigua Guatemala	7.4 M_i	IX
1751	1751 Guatemala earthquake	Antigua Guatemala		IX
1765-10-24	1765 Guatemala earthquake	Ostuncalco, Quetzaltenango	7.6–8.2 M_i	VII		Duration of shaking reported at 7–8 minutes.
1773-07-29	1773 Guatemala earthquake	Antigua Guatemala	7.5 M_w	VII–VIII	500–600	Severe damage in Antigua Guatemala and left most of the city in rubble.^[6]^[7]
1816-07-22	1816 Guatemala earthquake	Alta Verapaz	7.5 M_w	IX	23	see also Chixoy-Polochic Fault
1902-04-18	1902 Guatemala earthquake	Quetzaltenango, Guatemala City	7.5 M_w	IX	800–2,000	see also 1902 eruption of Santa María
1914-03-08	1913 Guatemala earthquake	Cuilapa	5.0 M_s		60	Destroyed the town of Cuilapa
1917-12-26	1917 Guatemala earthquake	Antigua Guatemala, Guatemala City	5.6 M_w	VII–IX	250
1918-01-04	1918 Guatemala earthquake	Guatemala City	6.0 M_w	VI
1942-07-06	1942 Guatemala earthquake	Escuintla	7.7 M_w	IX	38	Landslides.
1959-02-20	1959 Guatemala earthquake	Ixcán
1976-02-04	1976 Guatemala earthquake	Guatemala City, Belize	7.5 M_w	IX	23,000	Extreme damage, see also Motagua Fault
1976-03-12	March 1976 Guatemala earthquake^[8]	Chimaltenango	5.1 M_w	VII	4	Aftershock.
1978-07-29	1978 Patzún earthquake^[8]	Patzún	4.5 M_s		17
1979-10-27	1979 Guatemala earthquake^[8]	Chimaltenango	6.8 M_w		4
1985-10-11	1985 Guatemala earthquake	Uspantán	5.0 M_w	VII		Major damage in Uspantán
1988-11-03	1988 Guatemala earthquake	San Vicente Pacaya	6.0 M_w	VI	5
1991-09-11	1991 Guatemala earthquake	Pochuta	5.3 M_w	VII	25	Major damage in San Miguel Pochuta
1993-09-10	1993 Chiapas earthquake	San Marcos	7.2 M_w		1	Landslide/Rockslide.
1995-12-19	1995 Guatemala earthquake	Tucurú	5.3 M_w	IV	1
1998-01-10	1998 Guatemala earthquake	Santo Domingo Suchitepéquez	6.6 M_w	VI–VIII		Buildings damaged in Quetzaltenango and San Marcos
2001-01-13	January 2001 El Salvador earthquake	San Miguel	7.7 M_w	VIII	8	Epicenter in San Miguel, El Salvador
2011-09-19	2011 Cuilapa earthquake^[8]	Cuilapa	5.6 M_w	VI	1
2012-11-07	2012 Guatemala earthquake	Retalhuleu	7.4 M_w	VII	139	Heavy damage in San Marcos
2013-09-07	2013 Guatemala earthquake^[8]	Quetzaltenango	6.7 M_w	VI	1
2014-07-07	2014 Mexico–Guatemala earthquake	Antigua Guatemala	6.9 M_w	VIII	5
2017-06-14	2017 Guatemala earthquake	San Marcos	6.9 M_w	VI	5	Landslides
2022-02-16	2022 Guatemala earthquake	Nueva Concepción, Escuintla	6.2 M_w	VI	3	Several houses damaged

MM = Intensity on the Modified Mercalli intensity scale

References

^ "Studies related to seismicity and seismic hazard in Guatemala: seismic sources, past events and monitoring". Michigan Technological University. Retrieved 2010-03-15.
^ Cáceres, 2003
^ INSIVUMEH. "Marco tectónico para Guatemala".
^ ^a ^b INSIVUMEH. "Principales eventos sísmicos del siglo XX en Guatemala".
^ INSIVUMEH. "Marco tectónico para Guatemala".
^ Moncada 2003
^ "Terremoto de 1773 Guatemala". Provincia San Vicente Ferrer. Dominicos en Centroamérica. Retrieved 2010-02-27.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e "Significant earthquakes in Guatemala". World data.info. Retrieved 2020-04-22.

Sources

Cáceres Calix; José Diego (2003). Earthquake Sources and Hazard in Northern Central America (PDF). Upsala: Uppsala University. ISBN 978-91-554-5615-3.
Marshall, Jeffrey S. (2007). "The Geomorphology and Physiographic Provinces of Central America" (PDF). In Bundschuh, Jochen; Guillermo E. Alvarado (eds.). Central America: Geology, Resources and Hazards. Taylor & Francis. pp. 1–30. ISBN 978-0-415-41647-4.
Moncada Maya, J. Omar (5 May 2003). "En torno a la destrucción d la Ciudad de Guatemala, 1773. Una carta del Ingeniero Militar Antonio Marín". Biblio 3W. Revista Bibliográfica de Geografía y Ciencias Sociales. VIII (444). Universidad de Barcelona. ISSN 1138-9796. Retrieved 2010-02-28.
Olvera, Carlos; Villagrán, Juan Carlos, eds. (1996). "Terremotos anteriores en Guatemala" (PDF). Diagnóstico de la prevención de desastres naturales en Guatemala con motivo del XX aniversario del terremoto del 4 de febrero de 1976 (in Spanish). Guatemala: CIG, CONE, INSIVUMEH. pp. 367–76.
Tucker, Brian E. (1994). Mustafa Erdik; Christina N. Hwang (eds.). Issues in Urban Earthquake Risk. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. ISBN 978-0-7923-2914-5.
White, Randall A. (1985). "The Guatemala earthquake of 1816 on the Chixoy-Polochic fault". Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America. 75 (2). Seismological Society of America: 455–473.
White, Randall A.; Juan Pablo Lígoria; Ines Lucía Cifuentes (2004). "Seismic history along the Middle America subduction zone along El Salvador, Guatemala and Chiapas, Mexico: 1526-2000". In Rose, William Ingersol; et al. (eds.). Natural Hazards in El Salvador. Geological Society of America, Special Paper 375. pp. 379–96. ISBN 978-0-8137-2375-4.