April 28, 1935 Earthquake: Sichuan Province, China
A magnitude 6 earthquake struck Sichuan Province, China on April 28, 1935. It killed 2 people.
Map
Where it struck, with the other significant earthquakes within 200 km. Circles are sized and colored by magnitude; select one for its page.
The earthquake
- Date
- April 28, 1935
- Place
- Sichuan Province, China
- Magnitude
- 6 (Ms)
- Intensity
- VIII, severe shaking, on the Modified Mercalli scale
- Tsunami
- None recorded
- Epicenter
- 29.400° N, 102.300° E
- Country
- China
- Region
- East Asia
The toll
- Deaths
- 2
- Damage
- Limited (under about $1 million)
- Houses destroyed
- Few (about 1 to 50)
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.
What the record says
NCEI’s account, from the sources it cites.
April 28, 1935, Between Luding and Shimian, Sichuan Province, 29.4 N, 102.3 E, magnitude 6, intensity VII-VIII.
In and around Detuo, some walls and a few houses; collapsed, some shabby wood-frame houses were razed. Rocks collapsed and rolled down. The ground fissured in flat ground. Trees swayed and toppled down. Two persons and a few domestic animals were killed.
Shimian: Many watchhouses collapsed, rocks rolled down.
Luding: A screen wall fell in the county office, three
civilian houses and stables partly collapsed.
Fulin: Most of the unsteady houses collapsed, some were
partly damaged, one-tenth of the walls fell, rocks on hill collapsed.
Kangding: Some houses collapsed. Landslides occurred.
The ground fissured.
Xiaojin: The tiles on the eaves fell.
(above from reference #3939)
Sources NCEI cites
The publications NCEI lists for this record. The numbers match the “reference #” notes in its account above.
- #1068 Heck, N.H. (1944). Japanese Earthquakes. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, vol. 34, no. 3, July 1944, p. 117-136.
- #1003 Bath, Markus (1973). Introduction to Seismology, Halsted Press, 1978.
- #1006 Richter, Charles F. (1958). Elementary Seismology. W.H. Freeman and Co., San Francisco, California, 768 p.
- #1048 Academia Sinica (1970). Catalog of Chinese Earthquakes; vol. I (1177 BC to 1900 AD) and vol. II (1901 to 1949). Institute of Geophysics, Peking, China. [in Chinese]
Other significant earthquakes nearby
Within 200 km, the deadliest first.
- September 12, 1850, Xichang, Sichuan, China
- May 25, 1948, Sichuan Province, China
- June 1, 1786, S of Kangding, Sichuan Province, China
- August 29, 1893, Sichuan Province, China
- September 7, 1792, N of Qianning, Sichuan Province, China
- September 20, 1933, Sichuan Province, China
- March 6, 1932, Sichuan Province, China
- May 15, 1793, Near Qianning, Sichuan Province, China
- April 20, 2013, Longmen, Sichuan Province, China
- September 5, 2022, Sichuan Province, China
- April 2, 814, Xichang, Sichuan Province, China
- December 18, 1935, Sichuan Province, China
- April 14, 1955, Sichuan Province, China
- March 6, 1748, Sichuan Province, China
- November 22, 2014, Garze, Sichuan Province, China
More
Significant earthquakes of 1935The 1900sEvery quake the USGS located in 1935Recent earthquakes near hereThis day in weather history
Sources
Significant earthquakes from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, Global Historical Hazard Database, cited as NCEI/WDS, doi:10.7289/V5PN93H7. Public domain. Read 2026-10-01. NCEI earthquake 3547.