View Larger MapSo small and normal that it probably wouldn't have made the press, if it hadn't been "riding on the coat-tails of the Haiti earthquakes", as Janet Anscombe puts it.
The tremor, measuring 4 on the Richter Scale, was so light that they didn't notice a thing in Puerto de la Cruz, although reports claim that it was felt in Gran Canaria.
And "Some residents of blocks of flats in Las Chumberas, near Alcampo in La Laguna, fled from their homes fearing a building collapse," report Island Connections.
It happened at just after 3 p.m. on Friday, February 5th, with it's epicentre at 28.3904 latitude, -16.2212 longitude, some 10 kilometres south east of Santa Cruz and at a depth of 23 kilometres. Yes, a depth of 23 kilometres, not 23 meters (which would make the Atlantic Ocean very shallow indeed), as the report in La Opinion would have it. (I know, can't help nitpicking.) 
It was the very depth that prevented the quake from being widely felt and the quake was "without consequences", as Antena 3 report.
Apparently, there were "80 seismic movements last year, but only 4 were felt. According to experts this is normal", says Jack Montgomery. There have certainly been plenty in the area before, as this image shows. Experts also say there's "no risk of Teide erupting and there isn't another island about to rise up from the sea between Tenerife and Gran Canaria." Famous last words?
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