A 4.1 magnitude earthquake hit the city of Huizhou, Guangdong at 2.28am on Monday, March 14.
The coastal city reported that the earthquake had a focal depth of 25 kilometers and people as far as Hong Kong felt the tremors.
The central point of the earthquake was 45 kilometers away from the city center and the nearest townships or villages are 20 and 100 kilometers away, respectively.
The China Earthquake Network states that there have been six earthquakes of magnitude three or above within a 200 kilometer radius of the epicenter of the Huizhou earthquake in the past five years. The earthquake reported today is the largest of said six.
China has a history of earthquakes and one of the most notable occurred on December 16, 1920, in Gansu.
Some sources report that it was a magnitude 8.5 quake that may have killed 273,400 people. Of those deaths, 73,604 were reported in Haiyuan, causing loss of life to nearly half of the county’s population.
READ MORE: This Day in History: Massive Haiyuan Earthquake Devastates Gansu
Arguably the most infamous earthquake to hit China occurred in the province of Sichuan in 2008.
Commonly known as the Wenchuan Earthquake, over 80,000 people were reported dead or missing as a result of the 7.9 magnitude earthquake, which struck 80 kilometers northwest of the provincial capital, Chengdu.
Over 375,000 thousand people were reported injured and 4.8 million people became homeless due to the destruction caused.
Despite the quake only lasting two minutes, it brought down 80% of structures in the affected area and many small towns and villages were destroyed.
Official reports say that 5,300 children were killed as many schools fell as a result of the tremors.
The Wenchuan Earthquake was the strongest to hit China since 1950 and the deadliest since 1976.
Tremors were felt as far away as Shanghai, a whopping 1,700 kilometers away from the epicenter.
READ MORE: This Day in History: Deadly Sichuan Earthquake of 2008
In November 2021 a 5.0 magnitude earthquake struck the Yellow Sea, just off neighboring province Jiangsu, which was felt ever so slightly by residents in Shanghai.
READ MORE: Shanghai Struck by Earthquake, Nobody Notices...
[Cover image via Weibo@九派新闻]
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