The 1906 Ecuador–Colombia earthquake occurred at 10:36:10 ( UTC+5) on Wednesday, January 31, 1906, off the coast of

Ecuador Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. It also includes the Galápagos Province which contain ...

, near Esmeraldas. The

earthquake An earthquakealso called a quake, tremor, or tembloris the shaking of the Earth's surface resulting from a sudden release of energy in the lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from those so weak they ...

had a moment magnitude of 8.8 and triggered a destructive

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from , ) 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 underwater explosions (including detonations, ...

that caused at least 500 casualties on the coast of

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

Tectonic setting

The earthquake occurred along the boundary between the Malpelo plate, formerly considered the northeastern part of the

Nazca plate The Nazca plate or Nasca plate, named after the Nazca region of southern Peru, is an oceanic list of tectonic plates, tectonic plate in the eastern Pacific Ocean basin off the west coast of South America. The ongoing subduction, along the Peru– ...

, and the North Andes plate. The earthquake is likely to be a result of thrust-faulting, caused by the

subduction Subduction is a geological process in which the oceanic lithosphere and some continental lithosphere is recycled into the Earth's mantle at the convergent boundaries between tectonic plates. Where one tectonic plate converges with a second p ...

of the

Coiba Coiba () is the largest island in Central America, with an area of , off the Pacific coast of the Panamanian province of Veraguas. It is part of the Montijo District of that province. History Coiba separated from continental Panama between 1 ...

, Malpelo and Nazca plates beneath the North Andes and South American plates. The coastal parts of Ecuador and Colombia have a history of strong

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 earthq ...

s originating from this Malpelo-North Andes plate boundary.

Damage

The greatest damage from the tsunami occurred on the coast between Río Verde, Ecuador and Micay, Colombia. Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the tsunami vary between 500 and 1,500.

Characteristics

Earthquake

The rupture zone for this earthquake was long, and encompassed those for the earthquakes of

1942 The Uppsala Conflict Data Program project estimates this to be the deadliest year in human history in terms of conflict deaths, placing the death toll at 4.62 million. However, the Correlates of War estimates that the prior year, 1941, was th ...

(=7.9),

1958 Events January * January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being. * January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed. * January 4 ** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the thir ...

(=7.7) and

1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...

(=8.2). The lack of overlap between the three more recent events suggest the presence of minor barriers to rupture propagation along the plate boundary. Although these three events ruptured the same area of the plate boundary overall, they released only a small fraction of the energy of the 1906 earthquake.

Tsunami

The maximum recorded run-up height was in Tumaco, Colombia. At

Hilo Hilo () is the largest settlement in and the county seat of Hawaii County, Hawaiʻi, United States, which encompasses the Island of Hawaiʻi, and is a census-designated place (CDP). The population was 44,186 according to the 2020 census. I ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

a run-up height was recorded for this event. The tsunami was also noted in

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

Panama Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country in Latin America at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

and

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

Future seismic hazard

Because the sequence of three earthquakes that ended in 1979 did not release as much energy as the 1906 event, it has been suggested that an earthquake of similar magnitude to that in 1906 was likely in the near future. However, analysis of the amount of slip associated with the three later events suggest that they have released most of the accumulated displacement across the plate boundary since 1906. On 16 April 2016, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake occurred in the same area.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:1906 Ecuador-Colombia earthquake Megathrust earthquakes in Ecuador Megathrust earthquakes in Colombia 1906 earthquakes 1906 in Ecuador 1906 in Colombia 1900s tsunamis January 1906 Tsunamis in Colombia Tsunamis in Ecuador