Japan earthquakes

M5.1 earthquake 106 km ESE of Iwaki, Japan

A magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck 106 km ESE of Iwaki, Japan on Sat, Dec 24, 2016, 2:25 AM JST (17:25 UTC), 23 km (15 mi) below the surface.

A larger quake followed: M5.3 39 km ENE of Iwaki, Japan. This one was a foreshock.

Iwaki forecast More in Japan

Map

Where this earthquake was located, with the others nearby. Select one for its page.

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The earthquake

Magnitude: 5.1 (mb, body-wave), moderate
Magnitude from: USGS National Earthquake Information Center
Local time: Sat, Dec 24, 2016, 2:25 AM JST
UTC: 2016-12-23 17:25:02 UTC
Depth: 23.5 km (14.6 mi), shallow
Epicenter: 36.716° N, 142.002° E
Region: Japan
Felt reports: 7
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
5.1	mb, body-wave	USGS National Earthquake Information Center	Preferred · Reviewed · ±0.028 · 410 stations
4.96	Mw, moment	ISC-GEM global catalog	Final · ±0.1

What happened

The USGS’s account of the effects of this earthquake.

Felt at Iwaki, Mito, Sendai, Tomobe, Tsuchiura and Tsukuba. Recorded (3 JMA) in Fukushima.

From the USGS event page for us10007mba. U.S. Geological Survey text and figures are in the public domain.

Did you feel it?

7 people reported to the USGS what they felt; the strongest reported shaking was III, weak shaking.

How well it is located

Reviewed by a seismologist.

Location uncertainty: About 5.4 km horizontally, 3.5 km in depth
Magnitude uncertainty: ±0.03
Depth from: From location
Station coverage gap: 24°
Stations used: 344

Nearest places

Distance and direction from each place to the epicenter, with its forecast.

Nearby

Within 100 km, magnitude 2.1 and up: 21 in the 60 days after this one and 35 in the 30 days before it.

After

Before

Earthquakes today Japan earthquakes Live radar here

Sources

From the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program and its partner networks, event us10007mba (also filed as iscgem609927911). Read Sun, Oct 4, 2026, 3:03 AM UTC.