(This story was edited to add more information.)
An earthquake off the coast of Maine on Monday morning rattled parts of Massachusetts, including the South Shore, leading to a flurry of social media posts sharing individual experiences but requiring little in the way locally of emergency responders
The earthquake originated around 10:22 a.m. on Jan. 27, about 7 miles, southeast of Maine’s York Harbor, according to data from the United States Geological Survey. York Harbor is about 30 miles north of the Massachusetts border.
While initial estimates and online chatter originally placed the quake at around a 4.1 on the earthquake magnitude scale, it is currently being measured at a 3.8.
In terms of intensity, the earthquake caused light shaking mostly around the Massachusetts and Maine coastline, and some weaker shaking was felt inland, according to USGS maps.
Reports of rumbling, shaking from Quincy to Plymouth
South Shore town-by-town reports of the quake and its intensity were largely anecdotal. Even those who said they felt something often compared it to a large truck passing.
Most area police departments contacted late morning on Monday said they had not received any calls from residents in danger or confused by what they experienced.
A notable exception was in Quncy, where the city’s police department spent a busy morning assuring concerned callers that the shaking that caused loose objects to fall was not the beginning of the end.
“We’ve been getting calls all morning from people about their floors shaking or things falling off their walls and tables,” said Quincy Police Department dispatch officer Mike Bowes. “We’re informing them that it was a minor earthquake and there shouldn’t be a need for alarm.”
Wollaston resident Kenn Ryan expressed more excitement than alarm in describing what was his first earthquake experience.
“I was working at my laptop and the full-length mirror in the living room started first, shaking like a heavy wind was pushing through the closed windows,” he said in a Monday Facebook post. “As it got more intense, sounding like a fully loaded semi was passing on the street below … I could feel it in my feet like rubber knees after the gym and felt like a tank/bulldozer was rumbling past in the side.
Maine officials in town near epicenter report no damages
Police in the Maine town where it happened have yet to find any harm to buildings or other public infrastructure, said York Police Department Sgt. Brian McNeice.
York police drove out to the harbor, the reported epicenter of the earthquake, and did not locate any damages to private or public property.
“Nothing in the water, nothing out of place, everything appears to be the way it was before the earthquake,” McNeice said. “It seems like it was felt by a lot of people and we felt it here. Luckily nothing so far has been damaged or anything like that.”
Over the Piscataqua River, calls were made to Kittery, Maine’s fire department about noticable shaking but no injuries were reported and no property damage had been found.
“Our dispatch center took a lot of calls from concerned citizens reporting that they think something happened at their property,” Kittery fire Chief Craig Alfis stated. “So far everything has stabilized out and our dispatchers are back to normal operation. We haven’t been out on a call in 15 minutes so fingers crossed we’re past that.”
How common are earthquakes in NH?
New Hampshire has a moderate earthquake risk based on its position in the North American plate: according to a 2019 fact sheet from the NH Department of Environmental Services, there have been 65 earthquakes above magnitude 2.1 since 1638.
New Hampshire’s earthquake risk rating is based on frequency rather than intensity.
1638 New Hampshire Earthquake: What was the biggest earthquake in NH history?
While earthquakes in New Hampshire tend to be smaller, there have been similar magnitude earthquakes in the past, such as a 4.0 magnitude quake in Southern Maine in 2012 and another near Laconia in 1982.
The strongest earthquakes with an epicenter in New Hampshire in recorded state history happened four days apart in December of 1940. Each had a magnitude of 5.8.
However, historical records document a severe shake in 1638 reaching as far as Trois Rivieres, Quebec to eastern Massachusetts. With computer modeling, the event is hypothesized to have had a magnitude of 6.5 with an epicenter in central New Hampshire.
