Morocco

Morocco sits at one of the most geologically active convergence zones in Africa. The country lies just south of the Africa-Eurasia plate boundary — the Azores-Gibraltar-Tunisia fracture zone — and the convergence between the African and Eurasian plates at approximately 4 to 5 millimetres per year generates significant compressional stress across northern Morocco. This stress is expressed through the fold-and-thrust belt of the Rif Mountains in the north, the Middle Atlas and High Atlas mountain systems across the centre, and the Anti-Atlas in the south. All of these mountain ranges contain active or potentially active [[fault]] systems.

The northern Rif Mountains are tectonically the most active part of Morocco, situated immediately south of the complex Alboran Sea region where westward rotation of the Iberian microplate interacts with the northward push of Africa. The Nekor Fault and the Al Hoceima Fault Zone in northern Morocco have produced several damaging historical earthquakes. The Beni Mellal region in the Middle Atlas, and the Agadir area on the Atlantic coast, represent additional zones of elevated seismic hazard.

The most catastrophic earthquake in Morocco's modern history devastated the city of Agadir on 29 February 1960. The earthquake, with a [[magnitude]] of 5.9, was relatively modest in energy but struck at extremely shallow depth — approximately 3 kilometres below the surface — directly beneath the densely built city. The intense shaking at the [[epicenter]] collapsed an estimated 70 percent of the city's buildings within seconds, killing approximately 12,000 to 15,000 people out of a population of 33,000 — a casualty rate among the worst of any 20th-century earthquake. The disaster led to the complete reconstruction of Agadir on a new site.

On 8 September 2023, a devastating magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck the High Atlas Mountains approximately 70 kilometres southwest of Marrakesh. The [[epicenter]] was located near the village of Ighil in Al Haouz Province, at shallow depth on a previously poorly characterised fault. The earthquake killed over 2,900 people, injured more than 5,500, and destroyed or severely damaged thousands of traditional earthen (pise) buildings in remote mountain villages. It was the deadliest earthquake in Morocco since the 1960 Agadir event and among the most destructive in North African history.

The northern Rif zone produced a devastating earthquake near Al Hoceima on 24 February 2004 (magnitude 6.4), killing 628 people and injuring more than 900. An earlier Al Hoceima earthquake in January 1994 killed 758 people. These repeated disasters in the Rif reflect the ongoing seismic hazard along the boundary between the Eurasian and African plates.

Morocco's geological setting involves the northward drift of the African plate into the Eurasian plate, squeezing the rocks of the Rif and Atlas fold belts. The ancient Precambrian basement of the Anti-Atlas in southern Morocco grades into the Saharan platform and is essentially aseismic. [[seismic-wave]] attenuation is generally moderate in the Atlas region, meaning that energy from moderate earthquakes can be felt across wide areas of the country.