Significant earthquakes

Just to amplify the information from my previous posts, here is a list of the most significant earthquakes in this area supplied by my friend Fonta Bigastro on his Facebook page.

  

We moved to Bigastro in 2004 and so thankfully missed the 3.3 earthquake of 2000 centred on the town. We do recall the 2008 quakes in San Miguel and the one in Guardamar in 2012 though. The theory goes that a regular series of small quakes is a good sign because it means the plates are moving marginally rather than waiting to move in a sudden jump. We would rather they were in the 1 to 2 region of the scale though!

Look at this map which shows the most recent earthquakes. The strongest quakes are shown as large red circles; the weakest ones are small yellow circles. Notice that the strongest quakes are either south of us in North Africa or out in the Atlantic to the west of the Iberian peninsula.   In comparison with other regions of the world, we are relatively safe.