The 2003 Boumerdès earthquake was a magnitude 6.8 Mw earthquake that occurred on May 21, 2003 in northern Algeria.[3] The epicentre of the earthquake was located in the town of Thénia[4][5] in Boumerdès Province, approximately 60 km east of the capital Algiers.[4] The quake was the strongest to hit Algeria in more than twenty years[6][7] since 1980, when a magnitude 7.3 earthquake resulted in 3,500 deaths.[8]