February 8, 1843 Earthquake: Pointe-A-Pitre, Guadeloupe

The catastrophic earthquake devastated Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe, leaving it in ruins. One-third of the inhabitants of Pointe-a-Pitre perished, variously estimated at 4,000 to 6,000 and losses of 110,000,000 francs. The earthquake also affected Marie-Galante, Dominica, Montserrat, and Antigua.

1843, February 8. West Indies, Guadeloupe, pointe a Pitre, St. Lucia, St. Kitts, Antigua, Montserrat, Martinique. Intensity III which corresponds to an earthquake which destroyed towns and devastated districts. (reference #1055)

The 8 February 1843 earthquake occurred offshore between Guadeloupe and Antigua, the two most damaged islands, destroyed the city of Pointe-a-Pitre and killed more than 1500 people. The intensities estimated at IX in a large part of the arc between Dominica and Nevis and at II in New York City imply a large source of magnitude between 8.0 and 8.5 (Robson, 1964 and Shepherd and Lynch, 1992, Feuillet et al., 2011b, Hough, 2013). (reference #13358)

The Leeward Islands earthquake of 8 February 1843 is generally agreed to have been the biggest earthquake to affect this region since the early seventeenth century […] In Antigua the report states that "...the dockyard at English Harbour is sunk considerably, many parts being under water. The whole of the stone houses in a complete ruinous state, the walls partly or wholly down; the water tanks containing nearly 11,000 tons of water burst with an awful crash; the earthquake lasted about four minutes." In Pointe-a-Pitre, Guadeloupe, in addition to total destruction of all masonry building, "…the earth in several parts of the town opened to a considerable extent, when volumes of water spouted forth with awful fury to the extent of a hundred feet perpendicular in columns of several feet in thickness…" (reference #14503) Note: impacts to islands provided in detail

“This earthquake was considerably bigger than any other that has happened in this region in historical time” [Shepherd, 1992, p. 1541]. It destroyed the city of Pointe‐à‐ Pitre and killed more than 1500 people [Sainte‐Claire Deville, 1843]. It was associated with hydrological phenomena. Up to 1.5‐m‐high mud fountains were observed across the whole Grande‐Terre and along the eastern coast of Basse‐Terre […] The earthquake also induced large cliff collapses along the eastern coast of Guadeloupe and several landslides were reported on volcanic domes. It was reported that the Pointe‐à‐Pitre wharfs subsided by 30 cm [Feuillard, 1985; Bernard and Lambert, 1988]. Small islands also subsided in the bay of Pointe‐à‐Pitre. By contrast, the eastern coast of Grande‐Terre was apparently uplifted by few tens of centimeters [Sainte‐Claire Deville, 1843; Bernard and Lambert, 1988].(reference #13355)

In accordance with the 1843 earthquake epicenter (Lon: 61.17 W, Lat: 16.73 N) proposed by Feuillard (1985) and with respect to the accurate studies of Bernard and Lambert (1988), who proposed a magnitude Mw= 7.5–8.0 offshore rupture of circa 300 km (with the help of iso-seismal maps), and more recently Feuillet et al. (2011), who demonstrate that this event was probably the expression of a megathrust rupture on the subduction plane, with a magnitude re-evaluated to Mw= 8.0-8.5 […] (reference #14501)

Note: Many news articles (e.g. refs # 13201) state that Grand Cayman sunk due to an earthquake in 1843, ref #13202 attributes it to the 08 Feb 1843 Guadeloupe event. However, many newspapers (including refs #13203, #13204) quickly discredited the reports of Grand Cayman sinking