Caribbean earthquake appears on Kentucky seismograph

A 7.6-magnitude earthquake occurred north of Honduras and southwest of the Cayman Islands on Saturday.
The earthquake was detected by a seismograph in Sonora, Kentucky, which is in Hardin County.

A 7.6-magnitude earthquake in the Caribbean Sea registered on a seismograph in Hardin County Saturday, the National Weather Service in Louisville reported.

The earthquake, which originated north of Honduras and southwest of the Cayman Islands, was detected by a seismograph stationed in Sonora, around 50 miles south of downtown Louisville and roughly 1,500 miles from the approximate location of Saturday’s earthquake. A tsunami warning for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands was issued following the quake, but there was no danger to the continental United States, the National Tsunami Warning Center said in a statement Sunday. The tsunami threat later passed.

The earthquake Saturday occurred “as the result of strike slip faulting in the shallow crust near the boundary between the North America and Caribbean plates,” according to a report from the United States Geological Survey. At least 10 earthquakes with a magnitude of 6.0 or greater have occurred in the last century within 250 kilometers of Saturday’s quake.

An increase in earthquake activity in the New Madrid Seismic Zone, which includes Western Kentucky, was observed in November and December 2024, according to the Kentucky Geological Survey. There are usually two to four earthquakes a year within the zone, which also includes parts of Arkansas, Missouri and Tennessee.