On 28 March 2025, at 12:50:52 MMT (06:20:52 UTC), a Mw 7.7–7.9 earthquake struck the Sagaing Region of Myanmar, with an epicenter close to Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city. The shaking caused by this strike-slip shock achieved a maximum Modified Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). It was the most powerful earthquake to strike Myanmar since 1912, and the second deadliest in Myanmar’s modern history, surpassed only by upper estimates of the 1930 Bago earthquake. The earthquake caused extensive damage in Myanmar, particularly in areas near the rupture, and significant damage in neighboring Thailand. Hundreds of homes were also damaged in Yunnan, China, while more than 400 apartments were affected in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
The earthquake directly killed up to 5,352 people in Myanmar and 103 in Thailand, while one person died from shock in Vietnam. Up to 11,404 people were injured and hundreds more were reported missing. Most of the fatalities in Thailand occurred at a collapsed construction site in Bangkok, whose shallow geology makes it more vulnerable to seismic waves from far away. Authorities in both Myanmar and Thailand declared a state of emergency. As the earthquake struck during Friday prayer hours, collapsing mosques resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Muslims. In addition, more than 8,300 monasteries, nunneries and pagodas were destroyed. The ongoing civil war in Myanmar exacerbated the difficulty of disaster relief and info exposure. It was the deadliest earthquake globally since the 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes.
