2 small earthquakes rattle parts of Southern California

Earthquake early warning systems like ShakeAlert work because an alert can be transmitted almost instantaneously as the shaking waves from the earthquake travel through the shallow layers of the Earth at speeds of one to a few kilometers per second (0.5 to 3 miles per second). A pair of small earthquakes rattled parts of Southern California Thursday. Image: USGS website

COSTA MESA – A pair of small earthquakes rattled parts of Orange County Thursday.

The first temblor struck with a magnitude of 3.6 at 4:52 p.m. about a mile southeast of Costa Mesa and 1.4 miles east-northeast of Newport Beach, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS).

Just as people were calming down from that shaker, another quake with a magnitude of 3.4 struck at 5:04 p.m., this time 1.6 miles southeast of Costa Mesa and 1.7 miles east-northeast of Newport Beach.

There were no reports of damage or injuries.

ShakeAlert

Meanwhile, the entire US West Coast now has access to the ShakeAlert early warning system, the USGS has announced in a press release.

After 15 years of planning and development, ShakeAlert is now available to more than 50 million people in California, Oregon and Washington, the most earthquake-prone region in the conterminous US.

The ShakeAlert-powered public alerting to mobile phones in Washington completes the USGS and partners’ West Coast rollout of this mode of alert delivery to the public that began with California and expanded to Oregon in March 2021.

People in these three states can now receive alerts from FEMA’s Wireless Emergency Alert system, third-party phone apps and other technologies.

“USGS science is the backbone of hazard assessment, notification, and response capabilities for communities nationwide so they can plan for, and bounce back from, natural disasters,” said David Applegate, associate director for Natural Hazards exercising the delegated authority of the USGS director.

“Systems powered by ShakeAlert can turn mere seconds into opportunities for people to take life-saving protective actions or for applications to trigger automated actions that protect critical infrastructure.” (With CNS report)

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