On the evening of 18 September 2011, a magnitude 6.9 earthquake centred in the Indian state of Sikkim, just east of Nepal, shook the eastern Himalaya. In Nepal, several people were killed, including three pedestrians who died when a brick wall outside the British Embassy in Kathmandu collapsed. Across the region, the earthquake killed around 90 people, most of them in Sikkim.
In short: a magnitude 6.9 Sikkim earthquake on 18 September 2011 caused deaths and damage in eastern Nepal and Kathmandu, a reminder of the region's earthquake risk four years before the 2015 disaster.
Earthquakes in the Himalaya
The Himalaya is one of the most seismically active regions on Earth. Since 2011, Nepal has experienced the devastating 2015 Gorkha earthquake and the 2023 Jajarkot earthquake. See our 2015 earthquake report and safety guide.