The 1782 Mendoza earthquake took place in the

province A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman '' provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

of Mendoza,

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

, on 22 May 1782, at about 4 PM ( UTC-3). It had an estimated magnitude of 7.0 in the

Richter scale The Richter scale —also called the Richter magnitude scale, Richter's magnitude scale, and the Gutenberg–Richter scale—is a measure of the strength of earthquakes, developed by Charles Francis Richter and presented in his landmark 1935 ...

. Its

epicenter The epicenter, epicentre () or epicentrum in seismology is the point on the Earth's surface directly above a hypocenter or focus, the point where an earthquake or an underground explosion originates. Surface damage Before the instrumental pe ...

was at , at a depth of 30 km. This was the first documented earthquake of many which would affect the provincial capital of Mendoza since its foundation. It was felt with grade VIII (''Severe'') on the Mercalli intensity scale, and damaged several buildings, but did not produce casualties.

References

* Instituto Nacional de Prevención Sísmica
''Listado de Terremotos Históricos''

1782 Events January–March * January 7 – The first American commercial bank (Bank of North America) opens. * January 15 – Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris goes before the United States Congress to recommend establish ...

Mendoza, 1782 1782 in the Spanish Empire {{Argentina-hist-stub

See also

References