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2 quakes rattle Midwest City area

From the Oklahoman...

MIDWEST CITY. OK — Two small earthquakes were recorded in the Midwest City area in the last 24 hours, according to the Oklahoma Geological Survey.

The first one hit about about 8:45 p.m. Wednesday.

Residents in Midwest City, Del City and parts of eastern Oklahoma City heard a large boom, followed by a brief ground tremor, said Jim Lawson, of the Oklahoma Geological Survey. The quake measured a 2.6 magnitude on the Richter scale initially.

The second earthquake, with a 2.7 magnitude, according to the Oklahoma Geological Survey, struck at 12:14 a.m. today, according to the survey's Web site, and was felt by at least 1,000 residents.

No injuries or damage were reported, but calls poured in to Midwest City police dispatchers, according to police.

"The quake scared a lot of people,” Midwest City Police Chief Brandon Clabes said about the first quake. "We had multiple calls about shaking homes. They thought it was some kind of explosion.”

The epicenter of the earthquake could not be precisely pinpointed because there is no major fault line in Oklahoma County, Lawson said. Tremors could have been felt up to 10 to 15 miles away, but the quake was "small.”

"People heard a loud boom and so on,” said Charles Mankin, director of the Survey. "It probably was a shallow earthquake. It's not one of these deep-seated units that would be more destructive.”

Mankin said central Oklahoma experiences up to a dozen earthquakes each year. The area sits over a subsurface geologic structure called the Nemaha Ridge.

"These are fairly small earthquakes,” he said. "They're mostly adjustments.”

Tremors from the quake could have been felt up to 10 to 15 miles away from the epicenter.

The boom many residents reported was directly correlated to the quake, said Jim Lawson of the Oklahoma Geological Survey.

"As the earthquake waves pass your home, they're vibrating the ground up and down and that acts like a large speaker,” Lawson said. "When the seismic waves pass where the listener is standing, it sounds like a large boom.”