A medieval town shaken in the night. Its aftermath became a landmark in science and the law, when seismologists were tried over how the risk had been communicated.
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DownloadThe 2009 L'Aquila earthquake struck on April 6, 2009, registering magnitude 6.3 (estimated magnitude). Each whole step on the moment-magnitude scale is roughly 32 times more energy, so this released on the order of 3× the energy of a magnitude 6.0 earthquake.
Its epicenter was located near 42.33°N, 13.33°E, at a depth of about 9 km — a shallow crustal earthquake. Shallow earthquakes like this release their energy close to the surface, which is why the shaking near the epicenter was so violent.
An estimated 309 people were killed.