Earthquakes near Kaohsiung through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 7.1 on April 20, 1935 (14 km N of Taichung, Taiwan), for which NOAA records 3,276 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 36 here, back to 1661. NOAA records deaths in 26 of the events here, 10,904 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 6 on January 20, 2025 (10 km NE of Yujing, Taiwan). NOAA’s record here begins on January 8, 1661 with an earthquake (Tainan). It grows thinner going back: 27 of the 36 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here are from 1927 on. NOAA lists 2 tsunamis that began within 100 km of Kaohsiung, and 2 from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 30 m, in April 1781. The deadliest here came in April 1781 from Kaohsiung: NOAA’s runup records count one death within 100 km of Kaohsiung.

• January 20, 2025Earthquake · M 6.010 km NE of Yujing, TaiwanUSGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• September 20, 1999Earthquake · M 7.721 km S of Puli, Taiwan · 2,297 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• November 24, 1951Earthquake · M 7.8TaiwanUSGS
• April 20, 1935Earthquake · M 7.114 km N of Taichung, Taiwan · 3,276 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• April 1781Tsunami · 30 m hereKaohsiung · one death here (NOAA)NOAA NCEI
• January 8, 1661Earthquake · M 6.0 (est.)TainanNOAA NCEI

• An event counts for Kaohsiung 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