Mexico fans celebrating World Cup win against Ecuador cause ‘artificial’ earthquake

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The Independent

2 July 2026

The mass jumping of euphoric fans after

Mexico

scored

two match-winning goals

against

Ecuador

in a tense

World Cup

knockout game set off “significant”

tremors

, seismologists say.

Mexico’s Digital Platform for Early Warning and Comprehensive Risk Management (SASSLA) observed that “the outburst of euphoria and mass cheering” from fans

following the goals

in Tuesday’s match “produced vibrations in the local area”.

“The

Goal by Julian Quiñones

was just recorded on several seismographs,” SASSLA wrote on X.

“We also have the record of the second Goal by

Raúl Jiménez

at the 31’,” it said.

Three people were also crushed to death in

City after the match as nearly a million fans took to the streets to celebrate

Mexico’s 2-0 win against Ecuador led to its qualification

for the last 16 of the

open image in gallery

Raul Jimenez #9 of

celebrates scoring his team's second goal during the

FIFA

2026 (Getty Images)

Such “human-induced

earthquakes

” have

previously been reported

, caused by intense activities like the construction of massive high-rise buildings, or from groundwater extraction, or fracking.

Previous such events have also been recorded during sporting events or large-scale performances like a 2024

Taylor Swift concert.

“This is how it was registered at the nearest RaspberryShake station to the

Azteca Stadium

, an outstanding artificial signal. The burst of euphoria and mass shouting produced vibrations in the local ground,” SASSLA said after the match.

While not a real

earthquake

, the shakes due to the rapid vibration of people jumping at the same time and their collective thud against the ground generated short surface waves, the quake monitoring platform Sismo Alerta Mexicana said in a post on X.

Taylor Swift performs onstage during "Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour" at Johan Cruijff Arena (Getty Images for TAS Rights Mana)

“If someone walks near a seismograph, it will clearly detect it; and if several people jump at the same time near it, it's even easier,” it said.

“These are instruments that detect earthquakes on the other side of the world, so their sensitivity is extremely high,” the alert system’s official X account posted.

The phenomenon is not new and has been reported previously during major sporting events and concerts.

Julian Quinones #16 of

is thrown in the air by team mates as they celebrate after the team's victory (Getty Images)

Such events can produce unique vibration signals that resemble tremors, according to a 2024 research on the phenomenon published in the journal

Seismological Research Letters

For instance, a Swift concert in 2023 with over 70,000 attending fans recorded strong seismic vibrations in network stations located within about 9 km of the stadium.

“All evidence considered, we interpret the signal source as primarily crowd motion in response to the music,” scientists wrote in this study.

Players of

celebrate by dancing after the team's victory (Getty Images)

Scientists hope the findings from such artificial tremors can help build better seismographs that distinguish between the different types of vibrations.

It can also help study the structure of the subsurface Earth and construct buildings and auditoriums that respond better to vibrations, researchers say.

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