The Seismic Monitoring Research Unit (SMRU) of the University’s Physics Department is introducing this monthly report highlighting seismic activity in the Mediterranean.

The earthquakes shown on the map took place during May. Most of the quakes occurred in Greece and have magnitudes reaching five on the Richter scale. The map only shows regional quakes of a magnitude greater than 3.5.

There are hundreds more earthquakes that occur with weaker magnitudes but these, although detected by sensitive instruments, are either unnoticed by people or only felt locally.

The location of regional earthquakes is obtained from the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC).

Locally, the SMRU is more concerned with detecting and locating earthquakes in the Sicily Channel (red stars, inset map). These quakes are typically small in magnitude and take place offshore, usually within trenches (or grabens, shown as dark shades in the bathymetery) and on fault systems surrounding the Maltese islands.

The earthquakes near Malta on the map occurred on May 4, 11, 14 and 21. The largest event in this region in May was the magnitude 4.5 earthquake on the Libyan coast on May 11.

If you experienced earthquake-related shaking on the dates mentioned or any other dates, you are invited to fill the SMRU’s online questionnaire on http://seismic.research.um.edu.mt .

8.3-magnitude quake north of Japan

The SMRU also records large earthquakes occurring all over the planet far from its monitoring station in Wied Dalam.

Globally, a number of significant earthquakes occurred during May, the largest being a 8.3-magnitude quake north of Japan on May 24. However, since it occurred almost 600 km below the surface it did not cause any damage or a tsunami.

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