Many major

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fr ...

s have occurred in the region of the

Kamchatka Peninsula The Kamchatka Peninsula (russian: полуостров Камчатка, Poluostrov Kamchatka, ) is a peninsula in the Russian Far East, with an area of about . The Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk make up the peninsula's eastern and w ...

in far eastern Russia. Events in 1737, 1923 and 1952, were

megathrust earthquake Megathrust earthquakes occur at convergent plate boundaries, where one tectonic plate is forced underneath another. The earthquakes are caused by slip along the thrust fault that forms the contact between the two plates. These interplate earthqu ...

s and caused

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...

s. There are many more earthquakes and tsunamis originating from the region.

Tectonic setting

The southern part of the Kamchatka peninsula lies above the convergent plate margin where the Pacific Plate is

subducting Subduction is a geological process in which the oceanic lithosphere is recycled into the Earth's mantle at convergent boundaries. Where the oceanic lithosphere of a tectonic plate converges with the less dense lithosphere of a second plate, the ...

beneath the

Okhotsk Plate The Okhotsk Plate is a minor tectonic plate covering the Kamchatka Peninsula, Magadan Oblast, and Sakhalin Island of Russia; Hokkaido, Kantō and Tōhoku regions of Japan; the Sea of Okhotsk, as well as the disputed Kuril Islands. It was ...

along the line of the

Kuril–Kamchatka Trench The Kuril–Kamchatka Trench or Kuril Trench (russian: Курило-Камчатский жёлоб, ''Kurilo-Kamchatskii Zhyolob'') is an oceanic trench in the northwest Pacific Ocean. It lies off the southeast coast of Kamchatka and parallels ...

. The rate of convergence between the two plates is about 86 mm per year. Earthquakes are generated by rupture along the megathrust boundary between the two plates, within the descending Pacific Plate and within the overriding Okhotsk Plate. The northern part of the peninsula lies away from the

convergent boundaries A convergent boundary (also known as a destructive boundary) is an area on Earth where two or more lithospheric plates collide. One plate eventually slides beneath the other, a process known as subduction. The subduction zone can be defined by a ...

of the Kuril–Kamchatka Trench and the

Aleutian Trench The Aleutian Trench (or Aleutian Trough) is an oceanic trench along a convergent plate boundary which runs along the southern coastline of Alaska and the Aleutian islands. The trench extends for from a triple junction in the west with the Ulak ...

but across the boundary between two blocks within the North American Plate, the Kolyma-Chukotka and Bering Sea microplates. This boundary accommodates both active shortening and right lateral strike-slip across a series of large SW–NE trending faults.

1737 earthquake

The epicentre of the 1737 earthquake was located at . This earthquake occurred at a depth of 40 km (25 miles). A magnitude of 8.3 M_s (9.0M_w) has been estimated.

1841 earthquake

An earthquake of estimated magnitude 9.0 , with an epicenter just offshore, which triggered a large tsunami.

1923 earthquakes

On February 3, 1923, an estimated magnitude 8.3–8.5 M_w earthquake with an approximate location of triggered a 25-foot tsunami that caused considerable damage in Kamchatka, with a reported 3 deaths.Tsunami Laboratory, Novosibirsk, Russia
/ref> The tsunami was still 6 meters (20 feet) high when it reached Hawaii, causing at least one fatality. There was another earthquake and tsunami in April 1923, which caused locally high tsunami runup near Ust' Kamchatsk, leaving a deposit studied by Minoura and others.

1952 earthquake

The main earthquake struck at 16:58 GMT (04:58 local time) on November 4, 1952. Initially assigned a magnitude of 8.2, the quake was revised to 9.0 M_w in later years. A large tsunami resulted, causing destruction and loss of life around the Kamchatka peninsula and the Kuril Islands. Hawaii was also struck, with estimated damage of up to US$1 million and livestock losses, but no human casualties were recorded. Japan reported no casualties or damage. The tsunami reached as far as Alaska, Chile, and New Zealand. The

hypocentre In seismology, a hypocenter or hypocentre () is the point of origin of an earthquake or a subsurface nuclear explosion. A synonym is the focus of an earthquake. Earthquakes An earthquake's hypocenter is the position where the strain energy s ...

was located at , at a depth of 30 km (18.6 miles). The length of the subduction zone rupture was 600 km (373 miles). Aftershocks were recorded in an area of approximately 247,000 km² (90,367 square miles), at depths of between 40 and 60 km (25 and 37 miles). A recent analysis of the tsunami runup distribution based on historical and geological records give some indication as to the slip distribution of the rupture.

1959 earthquake

A magnitude 8.0 earthquake occurred on May 4, at a hypocentral depth of 20 km, with a maximum felt intensity of VIII MSK.

2006 earthquake

The region of

Koryak Autonomous Okrug Koryak may refer to: *Koryaks, a people of northeastern Siberia *Koryak language, language of the Koryaks *Koryak Okrug, an administrative division of Kamchatka Krai, Russia *Koryak, the son of Aquaman Aquaman is a superhero appearing in A ...

was struck by an 7.6 earthquake on April 20 (April 21 local time). It was followed by a large number of aftershocks, including two of 6.6. This was a reverse faulting event along the boundary between two microplates within the North American Plate. The event caused a 140 km long zone of

surface rupture In seismology, surface rupture (or ground rupture, or ground displacement) is the visible offset of the ground surface when an earthquake rupture along a fault affects the Earth's surface. Surface rupture is opposed by buried rupture, where th ...

2020 earthquake

The 7.5 earthquake occurred on March 25. The earthquake was the largest to occur in Russia since the

2013 Okhotsk Sea earthquake The 2013 Okhotsk Sea earthquake occurred with a moment magnitude of 8.3 at 15:44:49 local time (05:44:49 UTC) on 24 May. It had an epicenter in the Sea of Okhotsk and affected primarily (but not only) Asian Russia, especially the Kamchatka Penins ...

. It was initially reported as 7.8 , before being downgraded to 7.5. This shock was a result of near-trench intraplate compressional faulting within the descending Pacific Plate. The epicenter was in the area of the large-slip region of the 1952 Severo-Kurilsk earthquake, which was an M 9.0 megathrust event. Large compressional activity is more common before, and long after, major compressional events along coupled zones, suggesting interplate strain accumulation. In

Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky ( rus, Петропавловск-Камчатский, a=Петропавловск-Камчатский.ogg, p=pʲɪtrɐˈpavləfsk kɐmˈtɕatskʲɪj) is a city and the administrative, industrial, scientific, and cultu ...

, 285 miles (460km) away from the epicenter the intensity was felt at 5, objects were falling in buildings and people ran out into the street for safety. A tsunami warning was issued immediately after the earthquake. The Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre initially said hazardous tsunami waves were possible within 1,000km of the earthquake’s epicentre. It said earthquakes of this strength in the past had caused tsunamis far from the epicentre. A tsunami of about struck

Kamchatka The Kamchatka Peninsula (russian: полуостров Камчатка, Poluostrov Kamchatka, ) is a peninsula in the Russian Far East, with an area of about . The Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk make up the peninsula's eastern and west ...

References

External links

Землетрясения на Командорских островах

Землетрясения на Камчатке: информация, впечатления жетелей Камчатки
{{Earthquakes in Russia Kamchatka Peninsula 2020 earthquakes 2020 tsunamis Earthquakes in the Russian Far East 2020 disasters in Russia