1968 Belice earthquake
Successive earthquakes occurred in Sicily between January 14 and 15, 1968.
The 1968 Belice earthquake (Italian: terremoto del Belice) sequence took place in Sicily between 14 and 15 January. The largest shock measured 6.4 on the moment magnitude scale, with five others of magnitude 5+. The maximum perceived intensity was X (Extreme) on the Mercalli intensity scale. The earthquake sequence, centred between the towns of Gibellina, Salaparuta and Poggioreale in the area of river Belice, killed at least 231 people, possibly more than 400, with between 632 and about 1,000 injured and left 100,000 homeless.
Tectonic setting
Sicily lies on the complex convergent plate boundary between the African plate and the Eurasian plate. The geology of the western part of the island is dominated by the Gela Nappe, a thin-skinned fold and thrust belt. The Gela Nappe consists of Pliocene-Quaternary age sedimentary rocks deposited in the earlier foredeep, thrust up onto the thick carbonate sequence of the Pelagian-Hyblean Platform of the African plate.
Earthquake
There was a sequence of six M 5+ earthquakes, making this western Sicily's largest historical seismic event, beginning with a M 5.2 shock at 12:28 on the 14 January, followed by a M 5.1 event at 13:15 on the same day and a M 5.2 event at 01:33 on 15 January, the mainshock at 02:01, and two M 5.2 events at 16:42 on 16 January and at 09:56 on 25 January.
The greatest perceived intensity on the Mercalli scale was X (Extreme) at Gibellina, Montevago and Salaparuta. Intensities at Poggioreale, Trapani|Poggioreale, Santa Margherita di Belice, Santa Ninfa, Partanna and Salemi reached IX (Violent) on the scale.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “1968 Belice earthquake” is successive earthquakes occurred in Sicily between January 14 and 15, 1968. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Belice, earthquake and Successive, not as a finished interpretation.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1062315. Authority coordinates are 37.919, 12.998. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1968.
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This entry incorporates text from “1968 Belice earthquake” 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.