Brazil, Argentina, and Bolivia. Each of these countries have produced major magnitude 7 earthquakes, yet it appears to me that some people who live in South America are completely unaware of the level of local seismic hazard. Thus, today's video will briefly discuss the strongest earthquakes to have occurred in each South American country and region (including French Guiana), and shows an overall seismic hazard map for the continent. Thumbnail Photo Credit: Google Earth, Image © 2026 Airbus. This image was overlaid with text, and then overlaid with GeologyHub made graphics (the image border & the GeologyHub logo). This video's thumbnail image displays a segment of the right-lateral strike-slip El Tigre Fault in Argentina. If you would like to support this channel, consider using one of the following links: (Patreon: http://patreon.com/geologyhub) (YouTube membership: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYeGh5VML5XPr5jYnzh3J6g/join) (Gemstone & Mineral Etsy store: http://prospectingarizona.etsy.com) (GeologyHub Merch Etsy store: http://geologyhub.etsy.com) Google Earth imagery used in this video: ©Google & Data Providers This video is protected under "fair use". If you see an image and/or video which is your own in this video, and/or think my discussion of a scientific paper (and/or discussion/mentioning of the data/information within a scientific paper) does not fall under the fair use doctrine, and wish for it to be censored or removed, contact me by email at [email protected] and I will make the necessary changes. Various licenses used in sections of this video (not the entire video, this video as a whole does not completely fall under one of these licenses) and/or in this video's thumbnail image (and this list does not include every license used in this video and/or thumbnail image): Public Domain: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/ CC BY 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode Sources/Citations: [1] U.S. Geological Survey [2] Assumpção, Marcelo & Veloso, Alberto. (2020). The 1885 M 6.9 Earthquake in the French Guiana–Brazil Border: The Largest Midplate Event in the Nineteenth Century in South America. Seismological Research Letters. 91. 10.1785/0220190325. [3] Marcelo Assumpção, Marcelo Bianchi, Jackson Calhau, Daniel Rosa, Javed Baksh, Daniella Assing, Christopher Basdeo, Jiri Zahradnik, Fábio Dias, Romain Jolivet, Eric Calais; The 2021 5.6 Earthquake in the Guyana Shield, South America: An Intraplate Event with No Reason to Occur. The Seismic Record 2025;; 5 (2): 228–238. doi: https://doi.org/10.1785/0320250002 [4] Mark D. Petersen, Stephen C. Harmsen, Kishor S. Jaiswal, Kenneth S. Rukstales, Nicolas Luco, Kathleen M. Haller, Charles S. Mueller, Allison M. Shumway; Seismic Hazard, Risk, and Design for South America. Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America 2018;; 108 (2): 781–800. doi: https://doi.org/10.1785/0120170002 [5] Mao, G.L., Ferrand, T.P., Li, J. et al. Unsupervised machine learning reveals slab hydration variations from deep earthquake distributions beneath the northwest Pacific. Commun Earth Environ 3, 56 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-022-00377-x. CC BY 4.0. [6] Ohuchi, T., Higo, Y., Tange, Y. et al. In situ X-ray and acoustic observations of deep seismic faulting upon phase transitions in olivine. Nat Commun 13, 5213 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32923-8. CC BY 4.0. 0:00 Seismic Hazards 0:44 Strongest Earthquakes 1:10 Hazard Map 1:32 Plate Boundaries 2:56 Plate Subduction 3:39 Deep-Focus Earthquakes 4:18 Specific Earthquakes 5:00 Other Areas