M7.2 Nippes, Haiti, Earthquake

Event Summary | Summary
Posting Date: August 16, 2021, 12:00:00 PM

An M7.2 earthquake with a focal depth of 10 km struck at 12:29 UTC (8:29 a.m. local time) August 14.

ALERT™ subscribers can download similar stochastic event (SSE) IDs for this event from the Downloads tab. Compatible with Touchstone^® and Touchstone Re™ the SSEs were selected based on event parameters (not industry losses) and should be used only for exposures in Haiti. The information provided herein is strictly confidential and is solely for the use of AIR clients; disclosure to others is prohibited unless noted in your AIR software license.

USGS Tectonic Summary

The August 14, 2021, M 7.2 Haiti earthquake occurred as the result of oblique reverse motion along the Enriquillo-Plantain Garden fault zone, ~125 km west of the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince. The earthquake occurred at shallow depths on either a reverse fault striking west and dipping to the north with a component of left-lateral slip, or a fault striking southeast and dipping to the southwest with a component of right-lateral slip. At the location of the earthquake, the local plate boundary is dominated by left-lateral strike slip motion and compression. The plate boundary in this location accommodates eastward, left-lateral motion of the Caribbean plate relative to the North America plate. Within this context, the earthquake likely occurred on the east-west striking, north dipping fault plane with a component of left-lateral slip.

On January 12, 2010, an M 7.0 earthquake struck the same peninsula of Haiti and was located ~75 km east of the August 2021 earthquake. The 2010 earthquake caused substantial damage in the city of Port-au-Prince and the surrounding regions where damage from the earthquake and subsequent cascading hazards caused over 200,000 fatalities. [To read more about this earthquake, please read this AIR Current.] The August 2021 earthquake likely occurred within the same fault system as the January 2010 earthquake; however, the 2010 earthquake occurred on a blind thrust fault and not directly on the main plate-boundary fault.

Reported Impacts

The death toll has risen to nearly 1,300 people and is expected to climb as search and rescue efforts continue, as an unknown but substantial number of people are still missing. It is clear a humanitarian crisis has been caused by this quake, in an area that had not recovered fully from the January 2010 quake and had just experienced a political crisis after the assassination of its president last month. Roads have been made impassable; tens of thousands have been made homeless; homes, churches, and schools have been destroyed; potable water is in short supply; and hospitals are under-supplied and overwhelmed. In addition, Tropical Depression Grace is forecast to move over the area most affected by the quake today and could trigger landslides, which could further complicate the situation on the ground.

Event Summary | Downloads
Posting Date: August 16, 2021, 12:00:00 PM

The information provided herein is strictly confidential and is solely for the use of AIR clients; disclosure to others is prohibited.

Similar Stochastic Event IDs

Note: These lists give event IDs taken from our stochastic catalog that have similar characteristics as the current event.

Product	File Type	Description	Download
TOUCHSTONE / TOUCHSTONE Re	Excel (xls)	Selected set of stochastic events