Earthquakes near Oceanside through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 6.4 on March 11, 1933 (The 1933 Long Beach, California Earthquake), for which NOAA records 120 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 12 here, back to 1852. NOAA records deaths in 4 of the events here, 130 in all. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 5.1 on March 29, 2014 (La Habra, Brea, Fullerton). NOAA’s record here begins on November 29, 1852 with an earthquake. 5 of the 12 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here came before 1927. NOAA lists 5 tsunamis that began within 100 km of Oceanside, and 6 from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 1.8 m, on April 1, 1946.

• March 29, 2014Earthquake · M 5.1La Habra, Brea, FullertonNOAA NCEI
• October 16, 1999Earthquake · M 7.1The 1999 Hector Mine, California EarthquakeUSGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• June 28, 1992Earthquake · M 7.3The 1992 Landers, California Earthquake · 3 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• April 1, 1946Tsunami · 1.8 m hereUnimak Island, AkNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• March 11, 1933Earthquake · M 6.4The 1933 Long Beach, California Earthquake · 120 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• November 29, 1852Earthquake · M 7.0 (est.)NOAA NCEI

• An event counts for Oceanside 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