December 13, 2011 - A 6.0 Magnitude Earthquake Struck near Gorontalo, Sulawesi, Indonesia: The very earthquake prone south-west Pacific Ocean region, saw a 6.0 magnitude earthquake hit 42 miles south of Gorontalo, Sulawesi, Indonesia. At a relatively deep 160 kilometers (100 miles) a wide area was affected. However, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center stated that no tsunami warnings or watches were in affect.
The quake was 161 miles south-west of Manado, Sulvaesi, Indonesia (see map); 231 miles ENE of Palu, Sulvaesi, Indonesia; 607 miles NNW of Dili, East Timor; and 1,003 miles NNW of Darwin, Northern Territories, Australia. The tremor occurred at 3:52PM at the epicenter. It was 2:52AM in New York, 1:52AM in Chicago, 12:52AM in Denver and 11:52PM (Dec. 12th) in Los Angeles.
This region of the south-west Pacific Ocean is extremely earthquake prone. One-hundred-forty quakes, greater than or equal to 7.0 Magnitude over the last 40 years, have occurred here. That is over 40% of the most powerful earthquakes on the planet. Indonesia tops the list with 36; followed by The Solomon Islands (19), Papua New Guinea (16); the Philippines, Vanuatu and New Zealand with 14 each; The Kingdom of Tonga (7), Fiji (6), Samoa (7), Guam (4), Australia (3), and New Caledonia (2).
This region was the site of the December 26, 2004 mega-quake and Tsunami that killed over 230,000 people.
The Master of Disaster
With those small land mass islands so close together and the mountainous terrain underwater, there would be large scale devastation if any of those large earthquakes were shallower or strike slip!