Earthquakes near Villahermosa through history

The deadliest was not the strongest: a magnitude 3.5 on March 28, 1982 (Chiapas), for which NOAA records 1,879 deaths. NOAA’s list of significant earthquakes has 5 here, back to 1375. NOAA records deaths in 4 of the events here, 1,919 in all. NOAA’s record here begins in 1375 with an eruption (Chichon, El). It grows thinner going back: 2 of the 5 significant earthquakes NOAA lists here are from 1927 on. NOAA lists 4 significant eruptions of one volcano within 100 km of Villahermosa. The largest was Chichon, El in 1375, at 5 on the volcanic explosivity index.

• March 28, 1982Earthquake · M 3.5Chiapas · 1,879 deaths (NOAA)NOAA NCEI
• March 30, 1914Earthquake · M 7.5ChiapasNOAA NCEI
• September 23, 1902Earthquake · M 7.8Central Chiapas, MexicoUSGS · NOAA NCEI · Wikipedia
• 1375Eruption · VEI 5Chichon, ElNOAA NCEI · Wikipedia

• An event counts for Villahermosa 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