Southwest Alaska · 51.88°N
Earthquakes near Adak
Reading the latest USGS reports for the ground near Adak…
Live sections load from the USGS feed. If the feed does not answer, this page says so — it never fills the gap with old numbers.
Most felt near Adak — last 7 days, within 250 km
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Recent near Adak — last 7 days, M1.0 and larger within 250 km, newest first
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Every event links to its USGS event page, the authority for that earthquake. Distances are measured from Adak, not copied from the feed's place names.
The biggest on record near Adak — USGS catalog, as recorded
- M8.6Great1957 Atka, Alaska Earthquake
52 mifrom town - M8.0Great1986 Atka, Alaska Earthquake
85 mifrom town - M7.9Major77 km WSW of Adak, Alaska
47 mifrom town - M7.6Major5 km WNW of Adak, Alaska
2 mifrom town - M7.3Major88 km WSW of Adak, Alaska
54 mifrom town
The five largest earthquakes recorded within 200 km of Adak since 1900, from USGS catalog pulls made November 8, 2026. Pre-instrumental magnitudes are estimates, and catalog completeness varies by era — the fine print is on the about page.
How often does the ground move here?
756 earthquakes of M4.0 or larger were recorded within 200 km in the last 10 years — one of the most active rates. Since 1900 the catalog holds 4085 M4-or-larger events within the same radius.
Adak is, by the recorded numbers, the shakiest town on this site: over 4,000 M4-or-larger earthquakes within 200 km since 1900, including a 1957 M8.6 and a 1986 M8.0 in the Andreanof Islands — the Aleutian arc at full volume.
Southwest Alaska — why it shakes
From Kodiak Island west, the Aleutian megathrust takes over. The Pacific Plate dives beneath the island arc here at several centimeters a year, and the locked segments let go in some of the planet's largest earthquakes — 1946 (Unimak, M8.6), 1957 (Andreanof Islands, M8.6), and 2021 (Chignik, M8.2) all ruptured this stretch. Between the great ones, the arc crackles almost daily with small and moderate events.
New to the numbers? What magnitude means explains the scale in plain words — including why a whole step is about 32 times the energy, and why what people feel is not the same as damage.
Adak on the sister sites
Daylight in Adak — sunrise, sunset, and day length.
Aurora over Adak — tonight's northern lights outlook.
Sweeper Cove, Kuluk Bay, Adak Island — the nearest tide station in the fleet's inventory, 3 km from Adak.