Earthquakes near Bengkulu through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 7.9 on June 4, 2000 (103 km S of Bengkulu, Indonesia), for which NOAA records 103 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 10 here, back to 1770. NOAA records deaths in 7 of the events here, 285 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 5.4 on September 9, 2008 (Sumatra: Southern). NOAA’s record here begins in 1770 with an earthquake (Sumatra:). 4 of the 10 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here came before 1927. NOAA lists 3 tsunamis that began within 100 km of Bengkulu, and 2 from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 5 m, on September 12, 2007. NOAA lists 2 significant eruptions of 2 volcanoes within 100 km of Bengkulu. The largest was Kaba on November 24, 1833, at 2 on the volcanic explosivity index. It killed 126 people by NOAA’s count.

• September 9, 2008Earthquake · M 5.4Sumatra: Southern · 2 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI
• September 12, 2007Earthquake · M 8.4122 km SW of Bengkulu, Indonesia · 25 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• September 12, 2007Tsunami · 5 m hereSumatraNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• June 4, 2000Earthquake · M 7.9103 km S of Bengkulu, Indonesia · 103 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• November 24, 1833Eruption · VEI 2Kaba · 126 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• 1770Earthquake · M 7.0 (est.)Sumatra:NOAA NCEI

• An event counts for Bengkulu when it began within 100 km of its centre, or 200 km for an earthquake of magnitude 7 or more. Damage can reach further.
• USGS counts here start at magnitude 6: the catalogue’s smaller quakes thin out going back, where few instruments listened.
• NOAA lists significant events only: earthquakes that killed, did about $1 million of damage, reached magnitude 7.5 or intensity X, or raised a tsunami, and eruptions and tsunamis by like measures. Magnitudes before 1900 are its estimates from written accounts.
• Deaths are NOAA’s total for each event, wherever people died, its tsunami and fires included. A tsunami counts the dead its runup records give for this place: NOAA’s total for a tsunami includes its source quake’s.
• A tsunami from elsewhere counts where one of its runups killed or rose a metre or more.
• Counted to October 19, 2026, as is the map. The last 30 days ask USGS again.

How the layers work, where their data comes from and what they can’t tell you: Earthquakes, live, The world through history