Some Nicoya residents were worried about the possibility of a tsunami along the canton’s coasts following a strong earthquake that occurred this morning at 6 a.m. with an epicenter 62 km southeast of Playa Samara.
However, Marino Protti, a seismologist with the Costa Rica Volcanic and Seismological Observatory of Costa Rica (OVSICORI – ObservatorioVolcanologico y Sismologico de Costa Rica) confirmed to The Voice of Guanacaste that the event was not big enough to cause a tsunami on the Pacific coast.
“The earthquake was relatively [too] small to generate a big tsunami that people would notice. Also, the time that has passed between the event and now is too long for anything to have happened,” explained Protti.
The scientist reported the quake was not caused by a collision of plates, but rather an internal deformation of one of the Coco plate.
In addition, Protti indicated that the quake was not a repeat of the 2012 event, although it was related to the same subduction process.
In addition, the official ruled out that this morning’s earthquake has anything to do with the end of the rainy season in the canton.
“There is no relation; these quakes happen because of internal tectonic processes. They even happen 60 kilometers off the coast below the sea, at a depth of several kilometers within the Coco plate, so there is no relationship with climatological processes,” he explained.
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