Reported by EMSC7d ago
M2.9 earthquake in South Africa
Saturday, September 19, 2026, 21:40:30 UTC · 23.428°S, 31.460°E
A magnitude 2.9 earthquake struck in South Africa on Saturday, September 19, 2026, 21:40:30 UTC, at a depth of 10.0 km (shallow).
- Magnitude
- 2.9
- Minor · m
- Depth
- 10 km
- Shallow
- Reported by
- EMSC
- Agency SASN
- Nearest tracker
- 304 km
- from Maputo
Outlined circle: this earthquake
In context
How big was it, and why here?
Energy released
338 kg of TNT
That is about 1/44,601 of the Hiroshima bomb. A magnitude 5.0 releases about 1,413 times more energy.
Tectonic setting
166 km
from the nearest mapped plate boundary, between the Somali and African plates. Earthquakes this far from a boundary happen on faults inside a plate, often less frequently but sometimes strongly.
Depth: shallow
10 km
Shallow earthquakes (under 70 km) produce the strongest surface shaking for their size, so they are the ones most likely to cause damage near the epicenter.
After the main event
Aftershocks within 50 km
USGS and EMSC have not published any M2.5+ earthquake within 50 km since this event.
Regional history
Past M5+ earthquakes within 300 km
USGS lists 9 M5.0+ earthquakes within 300 km before this one (catalog from 1900; older records are less complete). The strongest:
- 6.1203 km N of Chokwé, MozambiqueMay 19, 1940 · 157 km NE of this epicenter
- 6.0209 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweMarch 19, 1951 · 287 km NE of this epicenter
- 5.8184 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweJuly 20, 1957 · 276 km NE of this epicenter
- 5.6171 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweSeptember 22, 2016 · 289 km NE of this epicenter
- 5.256 km ESE of Mathathane, BotswanaAugust 29, 1973 · 250 km NW of this epicenter
- 5.2143 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweMarch 22, 2006 · 296 km NE of this epicenter
- 5.1146 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweNovember 3, 1990 · 297 km NE of this epicenter
- 5.1134 km SSE of Chipinge, ZimbabweFebruary 3, 2008 · 288 km NE of this epicenter