The Geophysics Institute of Peru recorded a Magnitude 6.1 Earthquake at a depth of 25 km, to the west of the city of Sullana in the province of the same name, slightly after 3.25 am local time (slightly after 8.25 GMT) on Wednesday 5 October 2022. Four aftershock were felt in the area, and one person is reported to have died and two to have been injured following the Earthquake, although all three incidents were related to evacuations rather than directly caused by the event. The fatality was an elderly person in Paita Province who died of a heart attack during an evacuation, while the injuries were both sustained during falls in the city of Sullana, one to a 20-year-old woman who fell from the second floor of a building while trying to escape, and the other to a pregnant 39-year-old woman who also sustained injuries in a fall.
Peru is on the west coast of South America and the western margin of the South American Plate, close to where the Nazca Plate, which underlies part of the east Pacific, is being subducted along the Peru-Chile Trench. The Nazca Plate passes under the South American Plate as it sinks into the Earth, this is not a smooth process and the plates repeatedly stick together then break apart as the pressure builds up, causing Earthquakes. As the Nazca Plate sinks further it is partially melted by the friction and the heat of the Earth's interior. Some of this melted material then rises through the overlying South American Plate, fuelling the volcanoes of Peru and neighbouring countries.
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