Low-intensity earthquake hits Delhi, fourth in more than a month

On April 12, a moderate intensity quake of magnitude 3.5 hit the national capital at a depth of 8 km. The very next day, another low-intensity earthquake of magnitude 2.7 shook parts of Delhi.

A 2.2-magnitude earthquake hit national capital Delhi, news agency PTI reported quoting officials from National Centre for Seismology. The epicentre was in Pitampura in North-West Delhi, PTI reported.

People gather outside their houses after an earthquake in New Delhi in April. (Arvind Yadav/HT Photo)

This comes nearly a week after an earthquake of 3.4 magnitude struck near Sonia Vihar in North-East Delhi. Tremors were felt in parts of the national capital and the adjoining areas after the earthquake.

No casualty or loss of property was reported. The quake occurred at a depth of five kilometres.

This was the third earthquake in the national capital amid the nationwide coronavirus lockdown. Delhi witnessed two back-to-back incidents of low-intensity earthquakes in April with same location and nearby areas as the epicentre.

On April 12, a moderate intensity quake of magnitude 3.5 hit the national capital at a depth of 8 km. The very next day, another low-intensity earthquake of magnitude 2.7 shook parts of Delhi. The earthquake, with its epicentre near Wazirpur in northeast Delhi, occurred at 1.26 pm at a shallow depth of 5 km, said JL Gautam, Head (Operations) at NCS, an institute under the Ministry of Earth Sciences.

Of the four seismic zones in the country - Zone II, III, IV, V - Delhi falls under ‘Zone IV’. “Of these, Zone V is seismically the most active region, while zone II is the least,” says a release on country’s seismic zones by the Ministry of Earth Science.

The national capital is vulnerable to earthquakes but it is rare for it to be the epicentre of a quake. Delhi, however, experiences tremors when a quake hits regions as far as central Asia or the Himalayan ranges, known to be a high-seismic zone.