Earthquakes near Escuintla through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 7.7 on September 7, 1915 (12 km NW of Chalatenango, El Salvador), for which NOAA records 7 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 44 here, back to 1541. NOAA records deaths in 29 of the events here, 17,776 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 5.7 on July 8, 2025 (3 km SSW of Amatitlán, Guatemala). NOAA’s record here begins on September 11, 1541 with an eruption (Agua). It grows thinner going back: 20 of the 44 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here are from 1927 on. NOAA lists one tsunami that began within 100 km of Escuintla. It reached 4 m, on October 6, 2005. NOAA lists 21 significant eruptions of 4 volcanoes within 100 km of Escuintla. The largest was Santa Maria on October 25, 1902, at 6 on the volcanic explosivity index. It killed 10,000 people by NOAA’s count.

• July 8, 2025Earthquake · M 5.73 km SSW of Amatitlán, Guatemala · 7 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• October 6, 2005Tsunami · 4 m highLago De AtitlanNOAA NCEI
• September 7, 1915Earthquake · M 7.712 km NW of Chalatenango, El Salvador · 7 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• October 25, 1902Eruption · VEI 6Santa Maria · 10,000 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• May 30, 1776Earthquake · M 7.9 (est.)NOAA NCEI
• September 11, 1541EruptionAgua · 1,300 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Escuintla 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