Magnitude 6.9 earthquake recorded in the central Atlantic

The U.S. Geological Survey recorded an earthquake near the Mid-Atlantic Ridge on October 13. Russia's geophysical service gave a lower magnitude estimate of 6.2.

The U.S. catalog places the earthquake at 12:23 UTC, or 3:23 p.m. Moscow time. Its focal depth was 10 kilometers.

The Altai-Sayan branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Unified Geophysical Service located the epicenter roughly 990 kilometers north of Ascension Island. Ascension forms part of a British overseas territory with Saint Helena and Tristan da Cunha.

The different magnitude estimates refer to the same shock, rather than two separate earthquakes. The Russian service's description of shaking at the epicenter is not, by itself, a report of destruction on inhabited islands.

Earlier that day, the U.S. agency recorded a separate magnitude 6.7 earthquake in the central ridge region at 05:44 UTC. That event appears as a distinct entry in its catalog.