Magnitude-5.1 earthquake strikes near Midland, Texas, as thousands report shaking

A uncommon sturdy earthquake struck close to Midland, Texas, on Monday night, triggering greater than 1,000 studies of shaking, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.

The temblor, initially measured at magnitude 5.1, struck at 7:49 p.m. at a depth of about 5 miles under the floor, round 21 miles west-southwest of Ackerly, in accordance with the company.

No accidents had been initially reported.

The USGS obtained greater than 1,400 studies of shaking. Folks as distant as Fort Value — 282 miles east — and Austin — 322 miles southeast — reported feeling the earthquake.

The USGS mentioned in a abstract of the area’s modern geologic exercise that temblors east of the Rocky Mountains are usually felt for longer distances and do extra harm even when they’ve comparable magnitude scores.

“Earthquakes east of the Rockies which can be centered in populated areas and huge sufficient to trigger harm are, equally, more likely to trigger harm out to larger distances than earthquakes of the identical magnitude centered in western North America,” it mentioned.

Ackerly is about 60 miles north of Midland. The realm is thought for fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, a course of that injects water at excessive stress into the bottom to extract oil.

“There’s proof that some central and japanese North America earthquakes have been triggered or attributable to human actions which have altered the stress circumstances in earth’s crust sufficiently to induce faulting,” the USGS mentioned in its evaluation of the area.

No hyperlink between fracking and Monday’s earthquake has been established, nevertheless.

The USGS says that fracking will be linked to a small share of earthquakes and that extra are attributable to wastewater disposal.