4.9 magnitude earthquake hit Cyprus with two aftershocks

An earthquake of magnitude 4.9 on the Richter scale struck the seas off Paphos in Cyprus overnight.

No damages or injuries have been reported in the earthquake that occurred at around 12:29am on Wednesday September 4 and felt across the divided island.  

The tremors which lasted long enough alarmed some residents who got out of their houses and into the street. Residents in low-lying Paphos communities from Chlorakas to Kato Arodes, and as far as Limassol said they felt tremors.

The Paphos fire services were called out to rescue one woman who in her panic locked herself in a room of her residence.

The south Cyprus Geological Survey Department states that the earthquake occurred at 12.30am, with a focal depth of 13 kilometers, 18 kilometers southwest of the city of Paphos, and 72 kilometers west of Limassol.

The Geological Survey department recorded two aftershocks following the earthquake, according to its director Christodoulos Hadjigeorgiou, who said that the tremor “falls within the normal seismic activity of Cyprus”.

“Over the past thirty years, eight earthquakes ranging between 4.5 and 5.2 on the Richter scale have been recorded in this region,” he said, adding that the latest quake’s epicentre is located where the Cyprus Arc meets the transform fault, extending from south of Paphos to the northern coasts west of Polis Chrysochous.

A transform fault is a rock fracture along a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal, ending abruptly when connecting to another plate boundary, either another transform fault or a spreading ridge.

In a statement made by the TRNC Meteorology Department, it was stated that an earthquake of medium intensity and instrumental magnitude of 4.9 on the Richter Scale was recorded at 00:29 local time, approximately 82 km away from the Lefke Earthquake Station.

As a result of the first assessment, it was determined that the epicenter of the earthquake was at 34.56 North and 32.23 East coordinates, approximately 3.5 km deep off the coast of Paphos.

The earthquake was reportedly felt in neighbouring countries, including Lebanon, Israel, and Egypt.