A small earthquake reportedly shook the ground of East Georgia on Thursday morning in McDuffie County, just west of Augusta, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The seismic event occurred shortly before noon, and all indications point to it being only a minor shudder.
The 1.8 magnitude temblor may have been felt in the Georgia towns of Thomson, Grovetown, Evans and Martinez and perhaps as far away as Columbia, South Carolina, the USGS reported.
No damage or casualties have been reported near the quake’s epicenter.
The largest earthquake on record in the Georgia region was a magnitude 5.1 that occurred in 1916.
Earlier this year, on Jan. 10, parts of North Georgia were rattled by a 2.2 magnitude quake. That episode was about 10 miles outside of Dalton and 95 miles north of Atlanta.
More than three dozen earthquakes of magnitude 2.5 or greater have occurred in Georgia since 1974, according to the Survey. Yet, the state doesn’t have that many quakes compared to other areas.
Georgia had one of 2.5 or greater in 2018, one in 2015, one in 2014 and four in 2013.
A 4.4 magnitude earthquake in central Tennessee jarred some metro residents awake in January 2019, although the epicenter was 150 miles away from downtown Atlanta.
Georgia has a number of fault lines, where quakes are most known to occur.
The Brevard Fault Line, the best-known one, runs from Blue Ridge to Marietta. The Soque River Fault follows the Sogue River in the Northeast, and Salacoa Creek is in Northwest Cherokee County.
This is a developing story. Please stay with AJC.com for the latest details and updates.
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