An earthquake rocked Arusha and most parts of Northern Tanzania in the evening of Monday, December 16, 2024 at exactly 5.03 pm lasting for nearly 30 seconds.
The magnitude of the Monday evening tremor is still unknown but was mostly felt in Arusha City Center by many people.
In some places, the quake was so strong that some people claimed that cups fell from tables.
While many sites tracing and documenting earthquakes failed to register the occurrence in Tanzania, the shaking is reported to have been felt as far as Manyara and Kilimanjaro as well as some parts of Nairobi City in Kenya.
Arusha City is located nearly 200 kilometers from an active volcano, the Mount Oldoinyo L’engai located adjacent to Lake Natron in Engaresero village and ward of Ngorongoro District on the way to Loliondo.
About the same time that the quake was being felt in Tanzania, other parts of the world starting, as usual, with Japan, experienced the shaking as well.
According to the Volcano Discovery sire, the tremor also hit Santiago, Honolulu, Auckland, Belgrade, Tonga, Indonesia, Zurich, Athens, Hawaii and Nicaragua, all averaging at magnitudes of between 2.3 and 5.9.
The site documents that within 24 hours, between December 15 and 16 there have been a total of 1,133 quakes of magnitude up to 5.9: Among them 6 quakes above magnitude 5; then 28 quakes between magnitude 4 and 5 and 94 quakes between magnitude 3 and 4.
There have also been 249 quakes of between magnitude 2 and 3 plus 756 quakes of below magnitude 2 that people normally don’t feel.
On the other hand, the Earthquake tracker reported another earthquake near California in the United States.