ALL SHOOK UP
Lodi gets jolt as earthquake rattles foothills, valley
An earthquake jolted Central California on Thursday afternoon, shaking up residents of the Sierra Nevada foothills and the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys, including Lodi.
The shaking, registering magnitude 6.0, was centered in the Little Antelope Valley about four miles south of Coleville in Mono County, about 150 miles east of Sacramento.
Preliminary reports indicated two earthquakes had struck 25 seconds but 100 miles apart — but the U.S. Geological Survey revised the shaking and removed the report of a magnitude 4.8 quake in Farmington, about five miles southeast of Stockton.
The USGS said the report of a tremblor near Farmington was caused by system mislocation. Residents in San Joaquin County, the agency said, actually felt the 5.9 quake.
Facebook users commenting on an alert posted by the San Joaquin County Office of Emergency Services said they felt the rumbling in Tracy, Livermore, West Sacramento, Modesto and San Mateo.
The earthquake was the featured topic of discussion on local social media sites.
“I thought I was just dizzy at first or tripping, then I realized ‘oh, it’s an earthquake,’” Joe Gonzalez posted on the Lodi 411 Facebook page.
“I thought I left them behind in Fremont and LA,” Ken Campbell wrote.
Brandie Hernandez reported her entire car swaying back and forth, and her son witnessed “the clothes on his closet shaking.”
“My bed was moving and it made me dizzy,” Cherish Ry posted.
A swarm of at least 10 quakes in the Sierra followed — most of the aftershocks were between 4.2 and 3.0, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
“While there are no preliminary reports of damage or injuries, this is a rapidly evolving situation & more details will emerge in the coming hours,” the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services said on social media. “We are working closely with local officials to ensure they have the resources and support to rapidly respond to these earthquakes.”
The USGS said residents in San Joaquin County could expect to feel
some of the larger aftershocks coming from the area.
In Mono County, close to the Nevada state line and the location of earthquake swarm, workers at the Bridgeport General Store and Deli froze in place when they felt the shaking, cashier Pawahnee Minder said.
“The whole store was just shaking,” she said, adding that some decks of playing cards fell to the floor but that there was no other damage.
“It lasted a good minute, maybe two. We’ve had little ones before but this was the hardest one I’ve ever experienced,” said Minder, a 20-year-old who has lived in the town roughly 85 miles southeast of Lake Tahoe her whole life.
“It’s a pretty big aftershock series,” said Lind Gee, a geophysicist with the USGS. She said it’s typical for aftershocks to follow a quake of such magnitude.
She added that quakes are fairly common in the area near the California-Nevada border. “We have good-sized events in eastern California,” she said.
Nancy Vogel, deputy secretary for water at the California Natural Resources Agency at 1416 Ninth St. in downtown Sacramento, said she was on the 13th floor when the building began swaying.
“Our building emptied and people are milling around out front,” she said. “I never felt a quake that strong in Sacramento.”
Mary Lee Knecht, a U.S. Bureau of Reclamation official who lives in Land Park, said she was in her basement and “it felt like the ceiling was going to come down on me.”
Knecht said a friend in Curtis Park reported that “a table was shaking and things were falling off shelves.” Knecht said it was the first time she’s felt a quake in Sacramento in the 21 years she’s lived here.
Magnitude measures the energy released at the source of the earthquake, the U.S. Geological Survey says. It replaces the old Richter scale.
Quakes between 2.5 and 5.4 magnitude are often felt but rarely cause much damage, according to Michigan Tech.