The 1958 Ecuador–Colombia earthquake struck the coastal regions 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 ...

and

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 ...

on January 19 with a

surface-wave magnitude The surface wave magnitude (M_s) scale is one of the magnitude scales used in seismology to describe the size of an earthquake. It is based on measurements of Rayleigh surface waves that travel along the uppermost layers of the Earth. This mag ...

of 7.6 at 9:07 local time. Approximately 30 percent of Esmeraldas (Ecuador) was destroyed, including the children's department of the hospital, where three children died. At least 111 persons died and 45 were injured as a result of the earthquake. Water mains were broken and power transmission lines were damaged. The Esmeraldas-

Quito Quito (; ), officially San Francisco de Quito, is the capital city, capital and second-largest city of Ecuador, with an estimated population of 2.8 million in its metropolitan area. It is also the capital of the province of Pichincha Province, P ...

highway collapsed at many places. Many other roads of the country were made impassable by cracks and fallen trees. According to press reports, a

landslide Landslides, also known as landslips, rockslips or rockslides, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, mudflows, shallow or deep-seated slope failures and debris flows. Landslides ...

from the slopes of the

Andes The Andes ( ), Andes Mountains or Andean Mountain Range (; ) are the List of longest mountain chains on Earth, longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range ...

at Panado village buried a hundred people. The earthquake was destructive in the cities on the northern coast of the country and was strong from

Latacunga Latacunga (; Quechua: Latakunga) is a plateau city of Ecuador, capital of the Cotopaxi Province, south of Quito, near the confluence of the Alaquez and Cutuchi rivers to form the Patate, the headstream of the Pastaza. At the time of census ...

to Quito, Ibarra and

Tulcán :''"Tulcan" is also an alternative spelling of tulchan'' Tulcán () is the capital of the province of Carchi Province, Carchi in Ecuador and the seat of Tulcán Canton. The population of the city of Tulcán was 56,719 in the 2022 census. Tulcán ...

. It was felt at

Guayaquil Guayaquil (), officially Santiago de Guayaquil, is the largest city in Ecuador and also the nation's economic capital and main port. The city is the capital (political), capital of Guayas Province and the seat of Guayaquil Canton. The city is ...

.
/ref>

Tectonic setting

Ecuador and Colombia lie above a

convergent boundary 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 ...

where 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– ...

is being

subducted 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 plat ...

beneath the

South American plate The South American plate is a major tectonic plate which includes the continent of South America as well as a sizable region of the Atlantic Ocean seabed extending eastward to the African plate, with which it forms the southern part of the Mid ...

. The convergence rate is 55 mm per year and the subduction is significantly oblique to the boundary. This part of the plate boundary has been the location of a series of large historical earthquakes, including the =8.8

1906 Ecuador–Colombia earthquake The 1906 Ecuador–Colombia earthquake occurred at 10:36:10 ( UTC+5) on Wednesday, January 31, 1906, off the coast of Ecuador, near Esmeraldas. The earthquake had a moment magnitude of 8.8 and triggered a destructive tsunami that caused at leas ...

, which ruptured 5–600 km of the plate interface. Since 1906 there have been three major earthquakes that together have re-ruptured this same segment, in

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 ...

, 1958 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 ...

Damage

In Colombia,

Tumaco Tumaco is a port city and municipality in the Nariño Department, Colombia, by the Pacific Ocean. It is located on the southwestern corner of Colombia, near the border with Ecuador, and experiences a hot tropical climate. Tumaco is inhabited main ...

suffered most of all. Several old residences and a wooden home for railway workers collapsed. The large brick ovens used for drying pulp collapsed at the

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logging, logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes ...

s. The brick wall of the new church cracked. The walls of a number of other buildings cracked. The rafters of the roof of the

tide gauge A tide gauge is a device for measuring the change in sea level relative to a vertical datum. It is also known as a mareograph, marigraph, and sea-level recorder. When applied to freshwater continental water body, water bodies, the instrument may ...

box set up at the end of the

breakwater Breakwater may refer to: * Breakwater (structure), a structure for protecting a beach or harbour Places * Breakwater, Victoria, a suburb of Geelong, Victoria, Australia * Breakwater Island, Antarctica * Breakwater Islands, Nunavut, Canada * ...

(on Del Morro Island) came out of their grooves, the roof collapsed and carried the instrument and the box with it into the water. Pile wooden homes rocked so strongly in a north–south direction, that 8 cm gaps appeared in the ground at the foundations. The corrugated roof of the lower shed was bent in by the collision of two adjacent sheds. The embankments connecting Tumaco Island with adjacent islands crumbled and cracked. Bottles, vases, dishes, cameras, typewriters, etc. fell and broke. Water splashed out of tubs. The telegraph link between Tumaco and La Espriella was out of commission for 24 hours because of fallen posts. A resident of the city was injured. Eyewitnesses between Tumaco and Esmeraldas found it difficult to remain standing. Water gushed out of cracks in the ground on Manglares Cape, and trees fell. The earthquake was strong at

Pasto Pasto, officially San Juan de Pasto (; "Saint John of Pasto"), is the capital of the department of Nariño, in southern Colombia. Pasto was founded in 1537 and named after indigenous people of the area. In the 2018 census, the municipality ...

Ipiales Ipiales is a city and Catholic bishopric in Nariño Department, southern Colombia, near the border with Ecuador. It is located at around , with an elevation of about 2950 m. Ipiales is located on the high plateau called "Tuquerres e Ipiales," the ...

, Imuesa, Tuquerres and Sapuyas; it lasted about 40 minutes, but did not cause material damage. At

Cali Santiago de Cali (), or Cali, is the capital of the Valle del Cauca department, and the most populous city in southwest Colombia, with 2,280,522 residents estimate by National Administrative Department of Statistics, DANE in 2023. The city span ...

and Pereira, the population was frightened. At

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish Imperial period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city, capital and largest city ...

, the pendulums stopped on the clocks at the seismic station. Many recurrent shocks were felt at the epicentral zone; the two strongest occurred on January 19 at 9:45 and on February 1. According to geodesic data, the breakwater at Tumaco was shifted 1 cm along the vertical by the earthquake. The earthquake gave rise to a

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, ...

. A launch almost sank at Esmeraldas; four customs officers died. The waves damaged Tumaco and Guayaquil.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:1958 Ecuador-Colombia earthquake 1958 earthquakes Earthquakes in Ecuador Earthquakes in Colombia 1950s tsunamis 1958 in Ecuador 1958 in Colombia Tsunamis in Colombia Tsunamis in Ecuador 1958 disasters in Colombia 1958 disasters in Ecuador

Tectonic setting

Damage

See also

References

Further reading

External links