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2023 Herat earthquakes

7 October 2023 earthquakes in western Afghanistan

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 26, 2026
Entity authorityQ122971939 ↗
Source-derived summary

Four large earthquakes measuring Mww 6.3 each and their aftershocks affected Herat Province in western Afghanistan in early October 2023. The first two earthquakes occurred on 7 October at 11:11 AFT and 11:42 AFT near the city of Herat, followed by many aftershocks. On 11 and 15 October, two other magnitude 6.3 earthquakes struck the same area. These earthquakes were associated with thrust faulting. The World Health Organization estimated 1,482 fatalities, 2,100 injuries, 43,400 people affected and 114,000 people requiring humanitarian aid due to the mainshock. The 11, 15 and 28 October earthquakes caused a combined seven deaths and 344 injuries.

The earthquakes struck Afghanistan during an ongoing humanitarian crisis following the Taliban takeover in 2021, and existing aid groups were experiencing a lack of funds prior to the disaster. Some aid agencies including UNICEF and the Red Cross appealed for donations in response to the earthquakes. Many international organizations and countries participated in rescue and relief efforts. Hospitals were overwhelmed by the number of injured and lack of proper equipment.

Editorial summary

“2023 Herat earthquakes” enters the record as 7 October 2023 earthquakes in western Afghanistan. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Herat, earthquakes and October can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2023, 2021—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Herat, earthquakes and October.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“2023 Herat earthquakes” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Herat, earthquakes and October provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q122971939. Authority coordinates are 34.610, 61.924. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2023 and 2021.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  2. Expand the search: follow 2023 Herat earthquakes primary sources, 2023 Herat earthquakes archive and Herat research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “2023 Herat earthquakes” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.