Seismic activity in Ghana: past, present and future

Abstract

Though Ghana is far away from the major earthquake zones of the world, it is prone to earthquake disaster. Ghana has records of damaging earthquakes dating as far back as 1615. The last three major events occurred in 1862, 1906 and 1939. This paper presents the main historical and current instrumental recorded earthquakes of Ghana and the steps being taken to mitigate the negative effects of such disastrous occurrences in the country. The discussion is based on historical and current data obtained from the seismological observatories in Accra and Kukurantumi. Historical earthquakes of magnitude greater than 6.0 and current local tremors with magnitudes ranging from 1.0 to 4.8 on the Richter scale have been recorded since the establishment of the seismograph stations.