5.9 earthquake in Virginia shakes East Coast, rattles Michigan office buildings
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WASHINGTON — A 5.9 magnitude earthquake centered northwest of Richmond, Va., shook much of Washington, D.C., and was felt as far north as Rhode Island and New York City -- and across Michigan.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was 3.7 miles deep. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were evacuated. The quake was in Mineral, Va., in Louisa County.
Around 2 p.m., Connie Burke said she felt the Renaissance Center bounce for about 15 seconds from her desk on the 38th floor of Tower 100.
"I was moving up and down like I was in one of those kids' bouncy houses," she said. High up in the RenCen, "we feel the swaying on windy days, but this was big. I've felt things like this before in my time here in Michigan, but never anything like this."
Karah Street of Southfield, an account director for Stratacomm in Bloomfield Hills, said she and coworkers felt a soft shaking at their second-story offices.
"Everyone is just like, 'What's happening? Is your monitor shaking?' " Street said. "Our monitors and our chairs were just vibrating.
Leslie Dagg, an account supervisor for Bianchi Public Relations in Troy, said she and coworkers on the seventh floor of the New World Systems building at Big Beaver and Crooks felt two distinct bursts of shaking.
"It felt like the building was swaying, and there was a sense of dizziness or vertigo," Dagg said.
She said she got up to talk to her coworkers when a second round hit, a little stronger than the first and strong enough to cause a door that had been swaying to shut.
"Everybody in the office was on their feet, saying, 'Whoa!' " Dagg said.
The quake resounded almost immediately on social networks as Michiganders put out the news.
From Twitter:
From @Curri3r: Farmington Hills Michigan, 12 and Farmington road; 3 storie building shook
From @RebeccaDrewniak: yes in livonia @ AT&T building!
From @lxaj we felt it here in troy! aftershock of an earthquake perhaps?
From Facebook:
Sarah Culpepper: I thought I was losing my mind for a second!
April Sprader: Yep!!! Eastside near airport. Our 3 story building just swayed for about 30 seconds!!!
Cassandra Kardeke: How is it that we could have helt it all the way in Detroit?
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Quake rocks Washington area, felt on East Coast
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WASHINGTON (AP) -- A 5.9 magnitude earthquake centered in Virginia forced evacuations of all the monuments on the National Mall in Washington and rattled nerves from Georgia to Martha's Vineyard, the Massachusetts island where President Barack Obama is vacationing. No injuries were immediately reported.
The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was half a mile deep and centered near Louisa, Va., about 40 miles northwest of Richmond. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were evacuated.
Two nuclear reactors at the North Anna Power Station in the same county as the epicenter were automatically taken off line by safety systems around the time of the earthquake, said Roger Hannah, a spokesman for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The Dominion-operated power plant is being run off of four emergency diesel generators, which are supplying power for critical safety equipment. Hannah said the agency was not immediately aware of any damage at nuclear power plants in the Southeast.
Obama and many of the nation's leaders were out of town on August vacation when the quake struck at 1:51 p.m. EDT. The shaking was felt on the Martha's Vineyard golf course as Obama was just starting a round.
At the Pentagon in northern Virginia, a low rumbling built and built to the point that the building was shaking. People ran into the corridors of the government's biggest building and as the shaking continued there were shouts of "Evacuate! Evacuate!"
The U.S. Park Service evacuated and closed all National Mall monuments and memorials. At Reagan National Airport outside Washington, ceiling tiles fell during a few seconds of shaking. Authorities announced it was an earthquake and all flights were put on hold.
In New York, the 26-story federal courthouse in lower Manhattan began swaying and hundreds of people were seen leaving the building. Court officers weren't letting people back in.
The quake came a day after an earthquake in Colorado toppled groceries off shelves and caused minor damage to homes in the southern part of the state and in northern New Mexico. No injuries were reported as aftershocks continued Tuesday.
In Charleston, W.Va., hundreds of workers left the state Capitol building and employees at other downtown office buildings were asked to leave temporarily.
"The whole building shook," said Jennifer Bundy, a spokeswoman for the state Supreme Court. "You could feel two different shakes. Everybody just kind of came out on their own."
In Ohio, where office buildings swayed in Columbus and Cincinnati and the press box at the Cleveland Indians' Progressive Field shook. At least one building near the Statehouse was evacuated in downtown Columbus.
In downtown Baltimore, the quake sent office workers into the streets, where lamp posts swayed slightly as they called family and friends to check in.
Social media site Twitter lit up with reports of the earthquake from people using the site up and down the U.S. eastern seaboard.
"People pouring out of buildings and onto the sidewalks and Into Farragut Park in downtown DC...," tweeted Republican strategist Kevin Madden.
"did you feel earthquake in ny? It started in richmond va!" tweeted Arianna Huffington, president and editor-in-chief of the Huffington Post Media Group.
John Gurlach, air traffic controller at the Morgantown Municipal Airport was in a 40-foot-tall tower when the earth trembled.
"There were two of us looking at each other saying, `What's that?'" he said, even as a commuter plane was landing. "It was noticeably shaking. It felt like a B-52 unloading."
Immediately, the phone rang from the nearest airport in Clarksburg, and a computer began spitting out green strips of paper - alerts from other airports in New York and Washington issuing ground stops "due to earthquake."
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