La Palma registers an intensity ‘V’ earthquake

La Palma registers an intensity ‘V’ earthquake

According to the National Geographic Institute (IGN), since last midnight Sunday, November 28 into today, Monday 29, more than 50 seismic movements have been registered on the island of La Palma. One of these was of magnitude 5, the first quake to reach the intensity of V “pure” on a scale of XII, since the Cumbre Vieja volcano started erupting on September 19.

In a first automatic reading, IGN recorded two almost simultaneous seismic movements of magnitude 4.8, but, according to one of their seismologists, Itahiza Dominguez, one of them was an error in the reading of the automatic system. The false reading has since been revised to magnitude 5, occurring at 8:35am, located in the municipality of Mazo, at a depth of 35km.

Itahiza Dominguez explained that the latter is surely due to the fact that the energy of this seismic movement has been emitted more upwards than sideways. That is the reason why this latest quake was felt on La Palma yet not on the neighbouring islands of the Canary archipelago.

Earthquakes are measured according to their intensity, with regards to their effects on people and objects, on a scale from I (not felt) to XII (completely devastating). Today’s level V (strong) assumes that the earthquake is felt inside buildings by the majority and by some outside.

As outlined by IGN, observers would have felt a strong shaking or wobbling of the entire building, room, or furniture, with hanging objects oscillating considerably. Dishes and glassware could collide with each other, and small, unstable, or badly supported objects. can move or fall, as reported by 20minutos.es.

Equipo de INVOLCAN haciendo medidas en las coladas de lava / An INVOLCAN team making measurements in the lava flows pic.twitter.com/q8jRNF7F9r

— INVOLCAN (@involcan) November 29, 2021

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