Real-time coverage of earthquake event — 31 km NW of Aniso, Peru — Pandita Data.
🌍 OPEN LIVE 3D EARTHQUAKE MAPA magnitude 6.7 earthquake struck 31 km northwest of Aniso, Peru at 18:00 UTC on August 20, 2026, at 99 km depth. The US Geological Survey issued a GREEN PAGER alert, indicating minimal to no expected casualties or economic losses. No tsunami warning was issued due to the deep focal depth and distance from the coast. The event was felt by 70 people across the region but caused no reported damage.
This moderately strong earthquake occurred within the Andean subduction zone, one of Earth's most seismically active regions. Peru experiences frequent earthquakes along the Peru-Chile Trench, where the Nazca Plate descends beneath the South American Plate at a rate of approximately 80 mm per year. The 99 km focal depth places this event in the intermediate-depth category, characteristic of crustal stress within the downgoing slab rather than at the subduction interface itself.
The Aniso region lies within the Puno Plateau of southern Peru, approximately 380 km from the Peru-Chile Trench. The earthquake occurred along the Wadati-Benioff Zone, a dipping plane of seismic activity that marks the subducting Nazca Plate. Intermediate-depth earthquakes in this zone are driven by slab pull—the gravitational weight of cold, dense oceanic lithosphere sinking into the mantle—and internal deformation within the descending plate.
Southern Peru has experienced several notable earthquakes in the past century: the 1868 Arica earthquake (magnitude 9.0), the 1960 Valdivia earthquake (magnitude 9.5, the largest recorded), and the 2001 Arequipa earthquake (magnitude 8.4). The M6.7 event fits within the normal seismic background of the region.
The M6.7 earthquake released approximately 3.2 × 1019 joules of energy—equivalent to roughly 7.6 megatons of TNT. Deep subduction-zone earthquakes differ fundamentally from shallow crustal events. At 99 km depth, the rupture occurred within mantle peridotite (olivine-rich rock), where higher pressures and temperatures favour deformation through brittle faulting within the slab rather than plastic creep.
Shallow (<70 km): Located in brittle crust; higher ground shaking, more damage potential, greater tsunami risk. Intermediate/Deep (70–300 km): Located in subducting slab; ground shaking is attenuated by distance and inelastic damping; tsunami risk negligible. This M6.7 at 99 km dissipates energy efficiently, reducing surface impact despite its magnitude.
The nearest populated centre is Aniso (approximately 31 km SE), a small Quechua community in the Puno District. Peak ground acceleration (PGA) at Aniso is estimated at 0.3–0.5 g—sufficient to cause light to moderate shaking indoors but unlikely to damage well-constructed buildings. The USGS PAGER system assigned a GREEN alert because exposure to damaging shaking is minimal and population density is low.
Arequipa, Peru's second-largest city (pop. ~900,000), lies ~180 km away and experienced very light shaking. The Peruvian seismic network (IRISDMC) recorded the event across 15+ stations. No infrastructure damage or landslides were reported in preliminary assessments.