The NORSAR observatory recorded today, 25 May 2009, at 01.04.24 GMT seismic signals from a presumed underground nuclear test in North Korea. The test was earlier today reported to have taken place by the authorities of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
The event measured 4.7 on the Richter scale. For comparison, the previous North Korean nuclear test, on 9 October 2006, had a Richter magnitude of 4.2.
The event has been located to 41.28N, 129.07E. This is at a distance of 6270 km from NORSAR's monitoring station in Karasjok, northern Norway, which is the monitoring station in our network that first recorded the event. Since the seismic signals take 9 minutes and 41 seconds to propagate over this distance, the observations correspond to an origin time of the event of 00.54.43 GMT.
The figure above shows recordings from NORSARs monitoring stations in Karasjok,
as well as in Hedmark, southern Norway, where the seismic signals arrived
1 minute and 7 seconds later than at Karasjok.
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