A magnitude 4.2 earthquake struck Sacramento County, California, on Wednesday morning, spreading its touch across the beautiful expanse of the San Francisco Bay Area, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The U.S. Geological Survey reports that the earthquake occurred on Wednesday morning at approximately 9:30 a.m. close to Isleton, a tiny community in Sacramento County. No immediate reports of damage or casualties were made. It was lowered from its original magnitude estimate of 5.7.
During the earthquake, Chuck Bergson, the city manager of Isleton, told KCRA-TV that he heard some rumbling at City Hall and that certain levees along the Delta seemed to be in good condition.
Isleton resident Devin Petersen stated, “The entire floor was shaking. “I could feel it under my feet. It was strange. I detected waves.
The earthquake rocked store shelves in Isleton, jolted docks in Rio Vista, and caused traffic jams on the Rio Vista Bridge, which was immediately shut down for an inspection after the earthquake.
BART, the regional train service serving the San Francisco Bay Area, delayed trains for five to eight minutes to examine the tracks.
BART trains were briefly stopped by the earthquake as workers inspected the tracks for any potential damage. The service and tracks were unaffected.
The San Francisco Bay Area communities of Antioch, Concord, Fairfield, Martinez, Orinda, Danville, and even Berkeley, the location of the University of California, felt the tremor on Wednesday.
The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) rail service in the region was also temporally halted by the earthquake.
Earthquake prevention alert-
As a result, a “USGS ShakeAlert” was sent to potentially millions of Northern Californians, whose neighborhoods ranged from Sacramento in the north to San Francisco in the south, all the way to San Jose and Silicon Valley.
A warning to “Drop, Cover, and Hold On” was texted to mobile phones in the region, according to Sacramento-based NBC station KCRA.
A day prior to the state-wide Great California ShakeOut earthquake simulation, which will involve 10.1 million participants practicing how to stay safe during strong earthquakes, the earthquake occurred.
The majority of Californians, according to the California Earthquake Authority, reside 30 miles or less from any one of the state’s more than 500 active fault lines.
A few historical earthquake facts:-
The Sacramento-San Joaquin system’s higher portions have had more than 100 earthquakes since 1965; most of these were magnitude 3 or smaller, but they are still uncommon but not unheard of in the Delta.
There have only been three such incidents that were larger than magnitude 4 in the previous 60 years excluding Wednesday’s earthquake.
On September 10, 1965, a magnitude-4.9 temblor near Antioch was the greatest.
The earthquake also happened one day after the Loma Prieta earthquake, which shook the San Francisco Bay Area in 1989 and left 63 people dead and almost 3,800 injured. Damage from the destruction could have reached $10 billion.
The earthquake was ‘larger than it was’ as a result of the alert.
According to Christine Goulet, director of the USGS Earthquake Science Center in Los Angeles, even though the earthquake didn’t do any damage, the notice undoubtedly caught the attention of millions of people.
Goulet pointed out that the early magnitude estimations ranged from a 5.7 magnitude earthquake on the MyShake app to a 4.6 magnitude earthquake that was first reported on the USGS website. But that’s the point, he said.
In this instance, the seismic shaking occurred very near to the actual earthquake. “After a larger chunk of the shake was initially noticed, a wider area was immediately informed, Goulet added. q2xcde2. “It made the event appear bigger than it was.”
