View the 10 largest earthquakes ever recorded as of 2025, led by a 1960 magnitude 9.5 earthquake in Chile, which left about 2 million people unhoused.

The tallest tsunami in recorded history was 524 meters (1,720 feet) high—taller than the Empire State Building—and occurred in Lituya Bay, Alaska, in 1958 after an earthquake dislodged a rockface into the water.

Visualize the power and frequency of earthquakes across the moment magnitude scale, where a whole number increase corresponds to about 32 times more energy released.

View a map of the world's major earthquakes from 1956 to 2022, which can be used to identify tectonic plate boundaries.

If, not when: An earthquake is destined to destroy the Pacific Northwest.

When the Cascadia fault line ruptures, it could be North America’s worst natural disaster in recorded history. Read a deep dive into the history of the region and the potential impact of the eventual seismic boom.

Earthquakes of identical magnitudes are unlikely to cause equal damage because magnitude only measures energy released, and earthquake severity depends on environmental factors, such as local architecture and geological conditions.

A magnitude 25 earthquake would release enough energy to destroy the sun, while a particle of dust drifting onto a table would have a magnitude of about -15.

Why Turkey's earthquakes were so deadly

The death toll from February 2023 has reached the tens of thousands, making it one of the deadliest natural disasters of the century. The intense seismic activity combined with poor and unregulated construction in many areas to drive fatalities....

Reported earthquake magnitudes often change because initial values are based on limited information, whereas revised magnitudes account for factors such as fault size, rupture duration, and seismic wave behavior.

Although earthquakes cause about 80% of tsunamis, almost all earthquakes lack sufficient energy to cause the sudden shift in the ocean floor needed to substantially displace enormous volumes of water.

View the 10 biggest volcanic eruptions in recorded history

The Mount Tambora eruption in 1815 was the deadliest and released so much sun-blocking ash and gas that 1816 became known as “the year without summer.” The resulting global food shortages are estimated to have killed over 71,000 people.

Portugal's 1775 earthquake is considered Europe's first modern natural disaster.

Some earthquakes can produce smaller tremors called boomerang earthquakes, which travel in the opposite direction and ripple back to the original earthquake's source.

The world's largest earthquake simulator is an 800-ton shake table facility in Miki, Japan, which was built to test the resilience of structures after the 1995 Kobe earthquake killed over 6,000 people.

Micro-seismic activity has been produced from people cheering or dancing at sporting events, concerts, and other large gatherings, but scientists can easily distinguish these vibrations from natural earthquakes using seismometers.

How the Turkish earthquake created a 100-mile rupture

A February 2023 earthquake devastated parts of Turkey and Syria destroying entire blocks, with more than 50,000 people killed. A scientific analysis revealed a fault line with a 100-mile-long rupture, where separate tectonic plates moved more than...

Explore an interactive map of volcanoes, earthquakes, and tsunamis from 2150 BCE to the present.

View the past month of earthquakes worldwide with this digital globe, which displays data from the US Geological Survey.

Because the Richter scale was calibrated to crustal and mantle properties in Southern California, seismologists have instead used the moment magnitude scale to quantify earthquakes since the 1970s.

As of 2025, the world's largest tropical cyclone spanned half the continental US

Typhoon Tip traveled across the western Pacific Ocean in 1979, achieving winds of 300 kilometers per hour. Though it weakened significantly before making landfall in Japan, its rainfall produced over 600 mudslides and killed 42 people.

From 1610 BCE to 2025 CE, at least 250 of the over 3,000 confirmed tsunamis were deadly, and the 2004 Indonesia tsunami was the deadliest, with over 227,000 casualties.

Could the world's largest solar storm happen again?

In 1859, the world witnessed the most intense solar storm in recorded history. The electromagnetic deluge of dust and gas lit up the night sky and sparked fires, disrupting Earth's magnetic field and putting on a show for the millions. If a storm with a similar intensity today occurred, scientists believe it would be catastrophic for our communications systems. Learn what would happen if the Carrington Event happened again here.

Rather than predicting them in advance, earthquake early warning systems detect tremors moments after they begin and send notifications that reach users before the seismic activity does.

Explore an interactive time-lapse of reported tsunami events since 1850, with identified cause, recorded observations, known deaths, and other information available for each.

What is the Cascadia subduction zone?

A look at the Cascadia subduction zone, where the historical record suggests the Pacific Northwest is due for a devastating mega-earthquake in the coming years.

The strongest recorded geomagnetic storm in history created auroras near the equator

On Sept. 1, 1859, the Carrington Event—named after the astronomer who observed the preceding solar flare—saw a massive coronal mass ejection strike Earth, disrupting telegraph systems, sparking electrical fires, and reportedly illuminating the night sky enough to allow newspapers to be read at night.

See the lists of the worst hurricanes in the US through 2024

Several metrics, including wind speed, pressure, damage costs, and casualties, may be used to define the most devastating hurricanes. This page provides the top 10 hurricanes across each of these sorting methods.

NASA's GUARDIAN software uses changes in satellite navigation signals and AI-powered detection algorithms to anticipate tsunamis and provide real-time alerts to at-risk communities before the phenomena are detected by tidal sensors.

Supervolcanoes can eject enough material to fill one-fourth of the Grand Canyon

Although extremely rare, their released material can trigger winters by blocking the sun and cooling the Earth’s surface for years. The Toba supereruption 74,000 years ago disrupted food chains and reduced the human population to a few thousand.