A 5.6-magnitude earthquake struck Jamaica and prompted evacuations

AND Earthquake of magnitude 5.6 shook Jamaica this Monday morning, causing buildings to be evacuated, with no deaths or significant damage.

Due to the earthquake, buildings in the country were evacuated for safety, and citizens sought shelter.

The epicenter was recorded about four kilometers west-northwest of Hope Bay, at a depth of 10 kilometers, according to United States Geological Survey.

On the other hand, the University of West Indies Earthquake Unit indicated that the earthquake occurred about 10 kilometers south of Buff Bay, Portland, at a depth of 17 kilometers.

“The Department of Earthquakes at the University of the West Indies reports that the moderate earthquake had a preliminary magnitude of 5.6,” andJamaica National Radio reported an hour after the quake.

The tremor was felt in Bahamas, Cayman Islands, Haiti and on the smaller outlying islands of the United States and Cuba.

In September, Jamaica suffered another 5.2 magnitude earthquake.

An earthquake with an epicenter in Jamaica shook several provinces in the east of Cuba

Cuba also reported this Monday an earthquake measuring 5.7 on the Richter scale that was felt in several provinces in the east of the country, although its epicenter was in Jamaica, the National Center for Seismological Research (Cenais) reported.

So far, no material or human damage has been reported as a result of the earthquake – the 14th noticeable in 2023 – which was felt in the provinces of Guantánamo, Granma, Holguín and Santiago de Cuba.

Network of stations Cuban National Seismological Service The quake was recorded at 11:57 a.m. local time (15:57 GMT), at a depth of 7 kilometers with an epicenter in Jamaica, 205 kilometers southwest of Santiago de Cuba, the report said.

A day earlier, Cenais warned that he had detected “anomalous” seismic activity north of the province of Guantánamo (far east) registering 222 tremors, with a magnitude of up to 3.3 degrees since early Sunday morning.

Three of these earthquakes were felt in the municipality of Guantanamo Yateras.

The greatest seismic activity in Cuba is located in the eastern region and is associated with a fault located at the border of the North American plate, to which the Caribbean country belongs, and a fault on the neighboring island of Hispaniola, a territory that divides Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

Cuba is located in a region where different tectonic fault systems meet, where large-magnitude earthquakes have been recorded in recent decades.

Among them, the one from May 25, 1992, magnitude 6.9, which was felt in the eastern half of the country, and the one from January 28, 2020, magnitude 7.1, which is located near the Cayman Islands, but that felt throughout Cuba.