Magnitude 6.5 - 170 miles W of St. Matthew Is

Tectonic Setting of the Bering Sea

The northern part of the Bering Sea includes a wide, diffuse zone of seismicity extending from western Alaska across the Bering Strait into eastern Russia. This zone is believed to mark the northern boundary of the Bering microplate. The central region of the Bering Sea is virtually aseismic. The southern edge is marked by the Aleutian Archipelago, where seismicity is associated with ongoing subduction processes. The largest recorded earthquake in the Bering Sea, of magnitude 6.6, occurred in 1991 and was located 160 miles southwest of St. Mathew Island. In 2010, a magnitude 6.5 earthquake occurred about 150 miles northwest of the 1991 earthquake.