Earthquakes near Leshan through history

It was also the deadliest: NOAA records 87,652 deaths for it. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 9 here, back to 1786. NOAA records deaths in 6 of the events here, 90,028 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 4.9 on February 25, 2019 (21 km NW of Zigong, China). NOAA’s record here begins on June 1, 1786 with an earthquake (Sichuan Province: S Of Kangding). It grows thinner going back: 7 of the 9 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here are from 1927 on. NOAA lists one tsunami that began within 100 km of Leshan.

• February 25, 2019Earthquake · M 4.921 km NW of Zigong, China · 2 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• May 12, 2008Earthquake · M 7.958 km W of Tianpeng, China · 87,652 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• December 18, 1935TsunamiSichuan ProvinceNOAA NCEI
• June 1, 1786Earthquake · M 7.5 (est.)Sichuan Province: S Of Kangding · 435 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Leshan 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