Earthquake of magnitude 4.1 strikes Bangladesh, no casualties reported

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An earthquake of magnitude 4.1 struck Bangladesh in the early hours of Thursday, as reported by the National Center for Seismology (NCS).

Sharing the details in a post on X, the NCS said that the earthquake occurred at 5:44 AM Indian Standard Time (IST), at a depth of 30 kilometres.

"EQ of M: 4.1, On: 04/12/2025 05:44:45 IST, Lat: 23.95 N, Long: 90.72 E, Depth: 30 Km, Location: Bangladesh."

Earlier on November 21, at least three people were killed and ten others injured after a brick-built rooftop railing of an eight-storey building collapsed in Armanitola area of Dhaka after a 5.5-magnitude earthquake jolted several parts of Bangladesh, The Daily Star reported.

Shallow earthquakes are generally more dangerous than deep earthquakes. This is because the seismic waves from shallow earthquakes have a shorter distance to travel to the surface, resulting in stronger ground shaking and potentially more damage to structures and greater casualties.

Bangladesh sits where the three tectonic plates - Indian-Eurasia-Burma - meet. Currently, the Indian plate is moving in the north-east at a speed of approximately 6cm per year and the Eurasian plate is moving north at a speed of 2cm per year above the Indian plate. There are five major fault zones in and around Bangladesh, namely Bogura fault zone, Tripura fault zone, Shilong Plateau, Dauki fault zone and Assam fault zone, The Daily Star reported.

Thus, Bangladesh is a location of 13 earthquake-prone areas, and Chattogram, Chattogram Hill Tracts, and Jaintiapur of Sylhet remain in extreme risk zones. In 2022, Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, with 30,093 residents per square kilometer, was among cities with the highest population density in the world. And has been marked as one of the 20 cities most vulnerable to earthquakes in the world, as per The Daily Star.