Seismological Association of Australia

by Kevin MCue Abstract This paper lists 292 felt earthquakes in Victoria between 1837 and 1956 with better-substantiated dates, magnitudes and locations. A significant earthquake and aftershock listed in the previous version of this paper as 1868 actually occurred in 1869. Earthquakes felt throughout Melbourne in 1862 and 1892 and others have been re-discovered; it… Continue reading Historical earthquakes in Victoria: revised September 2024

By Kevin McCue Abstract Several hundred earthquakes felt in Australia have been documented in three volumes of the Isoseismal Atlas of Australia but sources have not yet been exhausted as we demonstrate with new information on interesting earthquakes in New South Wales thanks to the Australian National Library program Trove, that makes scanned, searchable newspapers… Continue reading Historical Earthquakes in NSW 1788 – 1959

Kevin McCue Within a year of the formal annexing of South Australia as a British colony, an earthquake shook the settlement of Adelaide. Aready, by July 1837, the first local newspaper had been published so news of the earthquake was in press. The spread of settlers can be charted by reports of earthquakes, at first… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1837 – 1859

by Kevin McCueJust 24 years after the formation of the colony of South Australia in 1836, the early europeans had become quite aware of local earthquakes. The Register newspaper was set up in 1837 and the locals dutifully reported their experiences of earthquakes to the Register or to the Chief Meteorologist, Charles Todd. He in… Continue reading South Australian earthquakes 1860-1869

by Kevin McCue There were just 88 South Australian earthquakes reported to newspapers in the decade 1870-1879. Five earthquakes were of magnitude 4 or more, the two larger earthquakes were of magnitude ML4.2, and occurred between Tanunda and Truro on 13 November 1874 and at Clare on 30 November 1879. In November 1873 reports of… Continue reading South Australian earthquakes 1870-1879

by Kevin McCue This decade saw a surge of interest in earthquakes in South Australia, partly due to the growth of communication with the overland telegraph service, partly the intersecting interest of a few leading scientists in the UK and Australia including Milne and Todd, and also an apparent significantly higher level of seismic activity… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1880-1889

by Kevin McCue Introduction The first earthquake deaths reported in Australia followed the second large earthquake in 5 years in South Australia, on 19 September 1902, the epicentre in Gulf St Vincent as best we can determine. An even earlier deaths has been uncovered here. The 1902 earthquake was the tipping point for the government… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1890-1897

Kevin McCue IntroductionThe first earthquake deaths reported in Australia followed the second large earthquake in 5 years in South Australia, on 19 September 1902, the epicentre in Gulf St Vincent as best we can determine. This earthquake was the tipping point for the government to finally agree to provide a seismograph in the state, after… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1900-1909

by Kevin McCue IntroductionThis study of earthquakes in South Australia using newspaper reports began, for the author, in 1975 and is not finished yet as more newspapers are digitised by the National Library of Australia. It confirms that earthquakes of the modern instrumental period following on from the International Geophysical Year in 1957/58 occur in… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1910-1919

by Kevin McCue Introduction Newspaper searches following new scans by the Australian National Library have recovered 40 previously undocumented earthquakes in South Australia and information to revise known historical earthquakes over the decade of the 1920s. There are fewer than expected based on the frequency of earthquakes there in the instrumental period (Love, 1996). These… Continue reading South Australian Earthquakes 1920-1929