Earthquakes near Sétif through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 5.6 on February 12, 1946 (Hodna Mountains), for which NOAA records 264 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 9 here, back to 1856. NOAA records deaths in 5 of the events here, 303 in all. NOAA’s record here begins on August 22, 1856 with a tsunami (Sea Of Alboran). It grows thinner going back: 8 of the 9 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here are from 1927 on. NOAA lists one tsunami that began within 100 km of Sétif, and 2 from elsewhere that reached it with deaths or a metre of water or more. The highest water NOAA records here was 5 m, on August 22, 1856.

• March 18, 2021Earthquake · M 6.021 km NNE of Bejaïa, AlgeriaUSGS · NOAA NCEI
• February 12, 1946Earthquake · M 5.6Hodna Mountains · 264 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI
• December 3, 1885Earthquake · M 5.9 (est.)M'sila · 33 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI
• August 22, 1856Tsunami · 5 m hereSea Of AlboranNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Sétif 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