Overview
Magnitude 7.2 on the Guerrero coast, the earthquake of 18 April 2014 damaged 127 houses and caused losses of about 49.5 million dollars without recorded loss of life. Shaking reached Mercalli intensity VIII near the source, whose position is 17.40 N, 100.97 W. The epicentre lies above the shallow-dipping segment of the Cocos plate that underthrusts southern Mexico, a stretch known for accumulating strain over long intervals. Mexico City, some 300 kilometres inland, amplifies distant subduction earthquakes because its centre rests on the soft lake sediments of the drained Lake Texcoco. No focal depth was assigned.
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Energy Released
63.4 atomic bombs
About This Earthquake
2014 Guerrero; Mexico City, Mexico: M7.2 at shallow depth. No fatalities reported. Cocos Plate subduction beneath Mexico.
Impact Details
| Damage | $50M |
| Houses Damaged | 127 |
Similar Historical Earthquakes
Frequently Asked Questions
The largest earthquake ever recorded was the 1960 Valdivia earthquake in Chile, at magnitude 9.5. It generated a tsunami that traveled across the Pacific Ocean and caused damage as far away as Hawaii and Japan. The earthquake killed approximately 1,655 people and left 2 million homeless.
The deadliest earthquake in recorded history was the 1556 Shaanxi earthquake in China, estimated at magnitude 8.0-8.3, which killed approximately 830,000 people. Many casualties resulted from the collapse of yaodong (cave dwellings) carved into loess cliffs. The 2010 Haiti earthquake (M7.0, ~316,000 deaths) was the deadliest in modern times.
Pre-instrumental earthquake magnitudes are estimated from written accounts of damage, felt reports, geological evidence such as fault scarps and liquefaction features, and tsunami records. These methods provide approximate magnitudes with typical uncertainties of 0.3-0.5 magnitude units.
QuakeFYI's historical database covers earthquakes from approximately 2150 BC to the present, with over 5,700 significant events. Written records from ancient China, Greece, and the Middle East provide some of the earliest accounts. Instrumental recording began around 1900 with the first standardized seismographs.
An earthquake swarm is a sequence of many earthquakes occurring in a localized area over weeks to months without a clear mainshock. Unlike aftershock sequences where one large event is followed by smaller ones, swarms have no single dominant event. They are often associated with volcanic activity or fluid migration in the crust.