M5.3 earthquake 3 km E of Bloomfield, California
A magnitude 5.3 earthquake struck 3 km E of Bloomfield, California on Wed, Oct 1, 1969, 9:56 PM GMT-7 (04:56 UTC), 15 km (9 mi) below the surface.
A larger quake followed: M5.3 Northern California. This one was a foreshock.
Map
Where this earthquake was located, with the others nearby. Select one for its page.
The earthquake
- Magnitude
- 5.3 (Mw, moment), moderate
- Magnitude from
- ISC-GEM global catalog
- Local time
- UTC
- 1969-10-02 04:56:49 UTC
- Depth
- 15.0 km (9.3 mi), shallow
- Epicenter
- 38.315° N, 122.807° W
- Region
- California
- Strongest shaking
- VI, strong shaking
- Tsunami flag
- No
- Status
- Reviewed by a seismologist
Magnitude estimates
Different scales measure different things and differ by a few tenths. The USGS marks one as preferred, and it is the one this page uses.
| Mag. | Scale | Computed by | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5.26 | Mw, moment | ISC-GEM global catalog | Preferred · Final · ±0.2 |
| 4.8 | Ms, surface-wave | USGS historic United States catalog | Final |
Deaths and damage
From NOAA NCEI’s Significant Earthquake Database (record 4502), matched to this event by time and place.
- Deaths
- 1
- Damage
- $8.4 million
Where the literature gives no number, NCEI records a description on a scale of 1 to 4, printed here in its words. Damage is in millions of US dollars of the year of the event, not adjusted for inflation.
From Wikipedia
At 04:56 and 06:19 UTC on October 2, 1969 (21:56 and 23:19 PDT October 1), a pair of earthquakes of magnitude 5.6 and 5.7, respectively, struck the city of Santa Rosa, California, killing one person and damaging buildings. The maximum felt intensity for the two events was VII (Very strong) and VIII (Severe) respectively on the Mercalli intensity scale. The $8.35 million cost of the earthquakes went mostly to replace buildings damaged beyond repair. There were at least 200 aftershocks after the initial pair of earthquakes. At the time they were the largest earthquakes to affect the northern San Francisco Bay Area since the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.
Text from Wikipedia, “1969 Santa Rosa earthquakes”, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Quoted as written; the full article has the rest.
The article is about the earthquake NOAA’s record describes, matched to this one by date, place and magnitude.
Wikidata records: 1 death. These are counts entered by Wikidata’s editors; they may differ from the official count, and this page never adds them to another figure. Q4573668, CC0.
What happened
The USGS’s account of the effects of this earthquake.
Maximum observed Modified Mercalli Intensity (MMI) VIII
From the USGS event page for iscgem803001. U.S. Geological Survey text and figures are in the public domain.
Shaking
The USGS ShakeMap: shaking estimated from seismic stations and the quake’s size, on the Modified Mercalli intensity scale.
- Strongest estimated
- VI, strong shaking
- Map
- Automatic
Did you feel it?
No one has reported feeling this quake to the USGS.
How well it is located
Reviewed by a seismologist.
- Magnitude uncertainty
- ±0.20
- Depth from
- From location
Nearest places
Distance and direction from each place to the epicenter, with its forecast.
Nearby
Within 100 km, magnitude 2.3 and up: 1 in the 60 days after this one and 0 in the 30 days before it.
After
Earthquakes todayCalifornia earthquakesLive radar here
Sources
From the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program and its partner networks, event iscgem803001 (also filed as ushis3058, atlas19691002045645). Read Sat, Oct 3, 2026, 3:22 AM UTC.