Earthquakes near San Juan del Río through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 6.7 on November 19, 1912 (2 km S of San Pedro el Alto, Mexico), for which NOAA records 202 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 6 here, back to 1837. The latest on NOAA’s list is a magnitude 4.8 on July 14, 1934 (Guanajuato, Queretaro). NOAA’s record here begins on October 18, 1837 with an earthquake (Mexico City, Acapulco).

• July 14, 1934Earthquake · M 4.8Guanajuato, QueretaroNOAA NCEI
• November 19, 1912Earthquake · M 6.72 km S of San Pedro el Alto, Mexico · 202 deaths (NOAA)USGS · NOAA NCEI
• June 19, 1858Earthquake · M 7.5 (est.)Mexico CityNOAA NCEI
• October 18, 1837Earthquake · M 7.0 (est.)Mexico City, AcapulcoNOAA NCEI

• An event counts for San Juan del Río 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