The first 4.5 magnitude quake hit shortly after 5 p.m. local time Wednesday followed by the larger 5.1 magnitude temblor at 6.47 p.m. With dozens of aftershocks it was the deadliest series of quakes in Spain since 1956m with over 80 percent of the buildings damaged and over 3,500 people homeless.
A number of devastating quakes have struck across the globe in recent years — from Japan to Chile to Haiti — sparking fears that our planet is due to experience even more catastrophic temblors in the near future.
#1 World’s Largest Earthquake
Chile, 1960 – Magnitude 9.5
Approximately 1,655 people were killed during the largest earthquake ever recorded. Thousands more were injured, and millions were left homeless. Southern Chile suffered $550 million USD in damage. The quake triggered a tsunami that killed 61 people in Hawaii, 138 in Japan and 32 in the Philippines. The earthquake ruptured where the Nazca Plate dives underneath the South American Plate, on the Peru-Chile Trench.