Residents of Pinar del Río described moments of fear and confusion following the 6.2 magnitude earthquake that shook the western part of Cuba this Monday around 2:00 PM, with its epicenter located in the waters of the Yucatán Channel, 142 km northwest of Minas de Matahambre.
The testimonies collected by CubaNet Noticias portray the emotional impact of an event that caught many Cubans by surprise.
A resident of the municipality of Sandino recounted that she was sitting in an armchair when it started to move. "My child and my husband were lying in bed, and the beds also began to move, the door started to move, the fan fell off the bed, the televisions moved," she described.
The woman recounted that the neighbors in her building ran down, many of them barefoot or in their underwear. "This was the biggest scare of my life. The biggest scare of my life," she repeated.
Another resident who worked on the second floor in the city of Pinar del Río recounted that at first she thought she was feeling dizzy. "Since I'm diabetic, I thought it was because I hadn't eaten anything for a long time. And when I realized, no, it was that my chair was moving too, the computer monitor in front of me was also shaking," she explained.
This witness estimated that the tremor lasted approximately 20 seconds. "It wasn't such a short time because it gave us time to react, and even then, the shaking continued," she noted, adding: "Here in Pinar del Río, at least for me, I'm not accustomed to feeling that."
Both agreed that practically everyone in their surroundings felt the movement, although the second witness stated that her mother in San Juan did not feel it.
The earthquake, recorded by the USGS with a magnitude of 6.1 and adjusted to 6.2 by the National Center for Seismological Research (CENAIS) of Cuba, was also felt in Miami and other areas of Florida, where multiple buildings were evacuated as a precaution.
The National Weather Service of the United States has dismissed the risk of a tsunami: "The tremors were felt in much of Florida following the 6.1 magnitude earthquake west of Cuba. No tsunami threat is expected."
In Havana, the impact was also significant. Residents of the capital described the panic caused by the earthquake in buildings and residential areas.
The Cuban scientific community did not anticipate an event of this magnitude in that location. The Cuban seismologist Enrique Arango Arias expressed his surprise at the phenomenon: "We would never have expected a 6.2 magnitude earthquake in that location."
The western region of Cuba has historically experienced less seismic activity than the eastern part of the country, where the Eastern Fault delineates the boundary between the North American and Caribbean plates. The most recent comparable event in the area was a magnitude 6.0 earthquake recorded on April 16, 2020, with its epicenter located southwest of Sandino, Pinar del Río.
This is the second major earthquake of the year in Cuba: in March 2026, a 6.0 magnitude earthquake struck the east and generated over 160 aftershocks. American meteorologist Matt Devitt described the event this Monday as "the second largest earthquake ever recorded in the Gulf of Mexico."
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