A Cuban resident in Miami shared on TikTok her experience during the strong earthquake that shook western Cuba this Monday, when a magnitude 6.2 earthquake with an epicenter in the Yucatán Channel was also felt in southern Florida.
The user @yossiegalindo71 was in her apartment when she noticed something unusual: a decorative board that she described as "never moves" started to sway, just like the leaves of a nearby plant.
“Gentlemen, who else felt the vibrations of the earthquake that just occurred in Cuba, near Pinar del Río? Well, I did. I felt it. I was here at home today, calmly, and this board that never moves... was moving like this. The leaves of this plant were also shaking,” he recounted in the video.
At first, the woman tried to find a more ordinary explanation for the phenomenon.
"I went out to the balcony and said let me see if everything is calm, if it's just in my head. I went out, everything was fine, I came back in, saw that this and the plant were moving, and thought that it was the wind from me opening and closing the door," he explained.
The confirmation arrived shortly thereafter, when the building management sent a notification to all residents.
"The building management has sent us a notification informing us that there are other people who are reporting vibrations and having felt tremors, and that if anything is broken in the apartment, we should let them know," detailed the Cuban woman.
The 6.2 magnitude earthquake shook the western part of Cuba at around 2:00 PM local time, with an epicenter located 142 km northwest of Minas de Matahambre, in Pinar del Río, at a depth of between 10 and 20 km.
The tremor was felt not only in Cuba but also in Miami and other areas of Florida, including Tampa, Jacksonville, Orlando, Naples, West Palm Beach, and even Disney World, as well as Mérida and Progreso in Mexico.
In Havana, residents described the fright with phrases like "I thought the building was falling down", reporting the sudden shaking of beds, chairs, and tables.
The meteorological authorities of Miami and San Juan ruled out the risk of a tsunami following the event, and no casualties or significant material damage were reported in the initial hours.
The Cuban seismologist Enrique Arango Arias, head of the National Seismological Service of Cuba (CENAIS), acknowledged that the earthquake took the scientific community by surprise, as it occurred on a very stable carbonate platform, with no history of significant seismicity and no relation to any known fault in Cuba or its surroundings.
This earthquake adds to a series of seismic events recorded in Cuba during 2026, including a magnitude 6.0 earthquake in Imías, Guantánamo, on March 17 that generated over 620 aftershocks in just over 24 hours.
For the Cuban in Miami, the experience was completely new: "At least in my experience in Miami, I don't recall ever feeling something like this here, especially coming from Cuba."
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