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Quake-Up Call: Magnitude 4.4 Temblor Rattles People Out Of Bed Across Southeast U.S.
December 12, 201812:04 PM ET
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A map provided by the U.S. Geological Survey shows the region that felt Wednesday's magnitude 4.4 earthquake.
U.S. Geological Survey
Before the sun rose Wednesday over Tennessee, some residents in the eastern half of the state got a wake-up call. But it wasn't a friend or partner shaking them awake, it was the very ground beneath their beds.
A magnitude 4.4 earthquake struck at around 4:14 a.m. ET near Decatur, Tenn., about 150 miles southeast of Nashville. But Tennessee residents weren't the only ones to feel the temblor. More than 7,700 people (so far) have reported experiencing it, from Kentucky and northern Alabama to the western Carolinas. The earthquake made its presence felt even in Atlanta.
"A lot of people were rattled awake — literally," Amy Vaughan, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey, tells NPR. She anticipates that, given the quake's mild intensity, it may have caused some structural damage or knocked objects off walls, but it likely did a lot more to shock residents than shatter their stuff. "I mean, this is probably not something people are used to."
With good reason: Vaughan says that since 1973, this is only the sixth earthquake greater than magnitude 4.0 to affect the seismic zone around the southern Appalachian Mountains. And it was the second-largest on record in eastern Tennessee, behind only a magnitude 4.7 quake 45 years ago." END QUOTE
Was anyone affected by this?
December 12, 201812:04 PM ET
A map provided by the U.S. Geological Survey shows the region that felt Wednesday's magnitude 4.4 earthquake.
U.S. Geological Survey
Before the sun rose Wednesday over Tennessee, some residents in the eastern half of the state got a wake-up call. But it wasn't a friend or partner shaking them awake, it was the very ground beneath their beds.
A magnitude 4.4 earthquake struck at around 4:14 a.m. ET near Decatur, Tenn., about 150 miles southeast of Nashville. But Tennessee residents weren't the only ones to feel the temblor. More than 7,700 people (so far) have reported experiencing it, from Kentucky and northern Alabama to the western Carolinas. The earthquake made its presence felt even in Atlanta.
"A lot of people were rattled awake — literally," Amy Vaughan, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey, tells NPR. She anticipates that, given the quake's mild intensity, it may have caused some structural damage or knocked objects off walls, but it likely did a lot more to shock residents than shatter their stuff. "I mean, this is probably not something people are used to."
With good reason: Vaughan says that since 1973, this is only the sixth earthquake greater than magnitude 4.0 to affect the seismic zone around the southern Appalachian Mountains. And it was the second-largest on record in eastern Tennessee, behind only a magnitude 4.7 quake 45 years ago." END QUOTE
Was anyone affected by this?
