By ADITHI RAMAKRISHNAN (AP Science Writer)
DALLAS (AP) — An earthquake with a magnitude of 4.8 struck near Lebanon, New Jersey, shaking the East Coast. The rumblings were felt in areas as far as Baltimore and the Massachusetts-New Hampshire border. No life-threatening injuries or major damage have been reported.
Here's what you should know about earthquakes on the East Coast.
Not many earthquakes big enough to be felt by a lot of people happen on the East Coast. Since 1950, there have been about 20 quakes with a magnitude above 4.5, according to the United States Geological Survey. This is in comparison to over 1,000 on the West Coast.
However, East Coast earthquakes like the one on Friday do occur.
Jessica Thompson Jobe from the USGS' Earthquake Hazards Program said, "There's a history of similar-sized earthquakes in the New York region over the last few hundred years."
In 2011, a 5.8 magnitude earthquake near Mineral, Virginia, shook East Coast residents from Georgia to Maine and even southeastern Canada. The USGS called it one of the most widely felt quakes in North American history.
The earthquake caused $200 to $300 million in property damages, including to the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.
The West Coast is located on a boundary where sections of the Earth's crust rub together, causing stress and slippage along fault lines that generate earthquakes often.
East Coast earthquakes like the one on Friday are caused by compression over time of hard, brittle rock deep underground, according to Robert Thorson, an earth sciences professor at the University of Connecticut. He said, "It's like having a big block of ice in a vise and you are just slowly cranking up the vise. Eventually, you're going to get some crackling on it."
These East Coast earthquakes can be more difficult to pinpoint and tend to affect a wider area. This is because colder, harder East Coast rocks are better at spreading the energy from an earthquake.
Also, the distribution of cities across the East Coast means that more people are around to experience the effects of an earthquake.
Leslie Sonder, a geophysicist at Dartmouth College, said, "We also have population centers over a large part of the northeast, so a lot of people around here feel the earthquake."
Experts from the USGS say there is a risk of aftershocks for weeks to months, which are expected after any earthquake. They recommend paying attention to emergency messaging from local officials.
To stay safe from shaking while sleeping, remove any furniture or objects that could fall and injure you or others.
If you feel shaking, drop where you are, cover your head and neck with one arm, crawl under a table for shelter, and hold on. If there's no shelter nearby, grasp your head and neck with both hands until the shaking stops.
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