Panic swept across the Southern California region late Tuesday as two preliminary magnitude 3.0 earthquakes shook the area within minutes of each other. According to ominous reports from the U.S. Geological Survey, the first tremor struck at 9:37pm and the second at 9:40pm, only 0.4 miles west of Bell in Los Angeles County.
Fortunately, no immediate damage has been reported so far. While tens of thousands of tremors are recorded in California every year, most are of minimal intensity and reported to be less than magnitude 3.0 – with only 15 to 20 greather than 4.0 on the Richter Scale. In fact, Alaska is famously recognized for recording more earthquakes annually than any other continental US state.
History was made back in 1857 when ‘The Fort Tejon Quake’ rocked the Golden State with a whopping 7.9 magnitude – its highest ever recorded – a fact to remind us of nature’s power to subdue us all.