Two shocks hit within five minutes of each other. The second was the bigger one, a magnitude 5.4 earthquake on Wednesday afternoon in Arunachal Pradesh, in northeastern India. Seismic agencies put its depth at 10 kilometers.
The smaller tremor came first, at the same depth. Seismologists said it may have been a foreshock, though they need to watch the ground over the coming days to know whether the sequence is settling down.
The epicenter was close to Shi Yomi district, a remote stretch of India’s border with Tibet. No deaths, injuries or damaged buildings had been reported by the time agencies filed their first accounts. Local emergency teams ran safety checks anyway.
Slow news from the mountains
Checking on the area is not quick. The district is steep mountain country dotted with isolated villages, and local administrators said communication travels slowly. Landslide-prone roads hold up inspection teams trying to reach the far-off border hamlets.
Why the ground keeps moving
The cause sits deep underground. The Indian plate pushes north beneath the much larger Eurasian plate at 40 to 50 millimeters a year. Along the Himalayan belt the two grind against each other and strain builds in the rock. When it snaps, the energy travels up to the surface as shaking. That is why tremors are a regular feature of the northeastern mountains.
Sources
- Moderate 5.4 Earthquake Jolts Arunachal Pradesh, No Damage…
- Magnitude 5.00 Earthquake Shakes Shi Yomi, Arunachal Pradesh, India
