According to USGS, a pair of earthquakes rattled eastern Tennessee on Wednesday morning, just a day after an unrelated pair of earthquakes struck Maryland near the Pennsylvania and Delaware state lines. The earthquakes were too weak to create any damage or injuries. The volume of earthquakes continue to increase in Tennessee year over year.
USGS reports the first earthquake struck at 9:57 am from a depth of 16.8 km; it was rated a magnitude 2.1 event.
The second earthquake struck a minute later at 9:58 am from a depth not as deep at 16.5 km. The second quake was rated as a magnitude 2.0 event.
Both earthquakes struck in Tellico Village, which is located southwest of Knoxville and northeast of Chattanooga. The earthquakes struck in an area that has experienced 9 earthquakes in the last 30 days
USGS says that earthquakes with a magnitude of 2.0 or less are rarely felt or heard by people, but once they exceed 2.0 , more and more people can feel them. While damage is possible with magnitude 3.0 events or greater, significant damage and casualties usually don’t occur until the magnitude of a seismic event rises to a 5.5 or greater rated event.
Earthquakes like the one that hit this morning in the eastern part of Tennessee are unlikely associated with the New Madrid Seismic Zone, an area of ongoing seismic activity located near the Mississippi River. However, while USGS says western Tennessee has a higher frequency of damaging earthquake shaking, the risk isn’t that low in eastern Tennessee. In the area of this most recent quake, USGS says its likely this area would see 50-100 damaging earthquakes over 10,000 years. While this number is low, it is much higher than it is elsewhere in the eastern half of the United States, where it’s likely to have 10 or less earthquakes over the same period.
The primary emergency advice for an earthquake in Tennessee is to “Drop, Cover, and Hold On” the moment one feels the ground shake. Because Tennessee sits directly between two active fault areas—the New Madrid Seismic Zone in the west and the East Tennessee Seismic Zone in the east—the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency (TEMA) emphasizes being physically and financially prepared for a sudden tremor.
According to USGS, the number of earthquakes in Tennessee is increasing over time. USGS says that the number of earthquakes in Tennessee hovered around just 30-50 per year during the mid-to-late 1990s. That number increased to approximately 150 in the mid-2000s and shot up to nearly 300 in the late 2010s. Over the last 365 days, USGS reports that there have been 297 earthquakes in Tennessee.
