2011 Lorca earthquake

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Destroyed station building in Lorca

The Lorca Earthquake of 2011 was a major earthquake. Located in the epicenter was located in the southern Spanish town of Lorca. The quake occurred on Wednesday, 11 May 2011 at 18:47 clock CEST ( 16:47 UTC). The earthquake had a magnitude of 5.1 Mw on the moment magnitude scale. The depth of the hypocenter of the earthquake was initially given as 1 kilometer; later three kilometers were called.

Impact of the quake

From the two towns of Lorca and Murcia major damage were reported. The earthquake killed at least nine deaths, about 300 people were injured. The former Spanish Prime Minister José Zapatero sent a special unit to the disaster area.

Possible Cause

An international research team led by Pablo González of the University of Western Ontario in Canada wrote in 2012 in the journal " Nature Geoscience " that earthquakes of this strength occur normally much lower and that human activities were probably responsible for the quake. According to her, the water table has dropped by around Lorca by continuously pumping the water since 1960 at least 250 meters. The researchers analyzed satellite images.