M 5.6 in Afghanistan on 04 Sep 2025 16:56 UTC

Event summary

This earthquake can have a high humanitarian impact based on the magnitude and the affected population and their vulnerability.

GDACS ID EQ 1498907
Earthquake Magnitude: 5.6M
Glide number: EQ-2025-000156-AFG
Depth: 10 Km
Lat/Lon: 34.719 , 70.7909
Event Date: 04 Sep 2025 16:56 UTC
04 Sep 2025 21:26 Local
Exposed Population: 210 thousand (in MMI>=VII)
Inserted at: 04 Sep 2025 17:46 UTC
INFORM Coping capacity:
7.5 (Afghanistan)

GDACS Score

For more info on GDACS alert score click here.
  Earthquake
(Shakemap)		 GDACS score
NEIC 3.5 3.5
us7000qtst Scaled population (raster) 4.49  
  C1 shakemap -0.59  
  C2 shakemap 0.53  
  Country Vulnerability 0  
  INFORM_normalised 1.29  
Maximum expected impact using different data sources.
Virtual OSOCC
Meteo assessment
Satellite products
Analytical products
Afghanistan - Earthquakes, update (ECHO 10 Sep 2025)Fri, 05 Sep 2025 10:05

  • A new strong earthquake of 5.6 M at a depth of 10 km occurred in the Kunar province, north-eastern Afghanistan on 4 September at 16:56 UTC (21:26 local time). The epicentre was located very close - approximately 1 km south - to the 6.0 M earthquake that occurred around 27 km north-east of Jalalabad city, Nangarhar province on 31 August at 19:17 UTC.
  • For this new event - part of the seismic sequence which started on 31 August - USGS PAGER estimates that up to 85,000 people were exposed to strong shaking and 411,000 to moderate shaking. Aftershocks continue.
  • Regarding the main event of 31 August, UN OCHA reports, as of 5 September, 2,205 fatalities, 3,604 injured people, and approximately 6,700 destroyed houses. Figures communicated by Afghan Authorities are even higher. At least 500,000 people are affected across the provinces of Kunar, Nangarhar, and Laghman. 68 water sources were destroyed by the earthquake and livestock perished in Kunar and Nangarhar.
  • Access  to lifesaving aid for affected women must be a priority, as local support teams mainly consist of men.   
  • Further to activating the Emergency Tools and the EU Humanitarian Air Bridge, the Copernicus Emergency Management Service is used for rapid mapping (), to support damage assessment.
Detailed event map. European Union, 2025. Map produced by EC-JRC.
The boundaries and the names shown on this map do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by the European Union.

Updates on volcanic activity (Smithsonian)

Latest media headlines

Afghan earthquake survivors refuse to return to villages | Kuwait Time.. 9/8/2025 4:27:00 PM.

MASUD, Afghanistan : Haunted by the fear that....
WHO urges Taliban to lift ban on female aid workers 9/8/2025 4:05:00 PM.

The World Health Organisation has asked Taliban authorities to lift restrictions on Afghan female aid workers , allowing them to travel without male guardians and help women struggling to access care after a powerful earthquake killed 2,200
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L’assurdo dramma delle donne afghane lasciate morire tra le macerie de.. 9/8/2025 3:38:00 PM.

Sembrava che le donne fossero invisibili ”, hanno detto quei volontari in Afghanistan orientale che hanno assistito, sbalorditi, alle operazioni di soccorso dopo il rovinoso terremoto del 31 agosto che ha causato più di 2mila e il crollo di
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Afghanistan quake: Women, children struggle to access aid 9/8/2025 3:16:00 PM.

09/08/2025 September 8, 2025. Women and children survivors of the Afghanistan earthquake told DW they are not getting enough aid. The Taliban have imposed several restrictions on women''s mobility, which experts say is one of the reasons be
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View more news

Estimated casualties (PAGER)

USGS estimates the number of casualties for each earthquake for the Prompt Assessment of Global Earthquakes for Response (PAGER) product.
The graph shows the current fatalities estimate.

Exposed population

Data, images, links, services and documents

For this events, GDACS has links to information from the following sources: EC-JRC (48), (3), NEIC (4), OCHA (1), INGV (1), USGS (5), WMO (1), INFORM (2),