The Caribbean Basin is located in a complex tectonic setting, shaped by the interactions of the Caribbean Plate with surrounding plates, featuring distinct zones of deformation: in the west, bordered by major transform faults such as the Oriente and Swan faults near Cuba and the Cayman Islands; in the center, marked by the Septentrional Fault and the Puerto Rico Trench, where oblique convergence and subduction occur; and in the east, defined by the active Lesser Antilles subduction zone, where the Atlantic oceanic crust descends beneath the Caribbean arc, generating intense seismic and volcanic activity. The following is a list of major or notable earthquakes that have directly affected the Caribbean region; it includes earthquakes measuring at least 6.5 magnitude or earthquakes which have directly caused life loss, injuries or significant damage to the region.
Earthquakes
See also List of earthquakes in Cuba List of earthquakes in the Dominican Republic List of earthquakes in Haiti List of earthquakes in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) University of the West Indies Seismic Research Centre
References
Sources
Further reading Corbeau, Jordane; Gonzalez, O'Leary; Feuillet, Nathalie; Lejeune, Anne-Marie; Fontaine, Fabrice R.; Clouard, Valérie; Saurel, Jean-Marie (2021), "A Significant Increase in Interplate Seismicity near Major Historical Earthquakes Offshore Martinique (FWI)", Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 111 (6): 3118–3135, Bibcode:2021BuSSA.111.3118C, doi:10.1785/0120200377, S2CID 237869398 López-Marrero, Tania; Wisner, Ben (2012), "Not in the Same Boat: Disasters and Differential Vulnerability in the Insular Caribbean", Caribbean Studies, 40 (2): 129–168, doi:10.1353/crb.2012.0034, JSTOR 41917606, S2CID 132516977 von Hillebrandt-Andrade, Christa (2013), "Minimizing Caribbean Tsunami Risk", Science, 341 (6149): 966–968, Bibcode:2013Sci...341..966V, doi:10.1126/science.1238943, JSTOR 23491375, PMID 23990549, S2CID 207789555 Megan Torpey Zimmerman; Bingming Shen‐Tu; Khosrow Shabestari; Mehrdad Mahdyiar Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America (2022) 112 (2): 1120–1148. https://doi.org/10.1785/0120210157
External links Elizabeth Vanacore (Oct 23, 2019), Earthquakes in Paradise: Earthquake and Tsunami Monitoring in the Northeast Caribbean, IRIS Earthquake Science – via YouTube
