Tremors felt throughout Buckeye State

June 24, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Associated Press

CLEVELAND

A powerful Canadian earthquake hundreds of miles away rattled Ohio on Wednesday, with the sound of plaster cracking in Cleveland and buildings in Cincinnati gently swaying.

There were no immediate reports of any damage in Ohio from the 1:41 p.m. quake with a magnitude of 5. It struck near the Ontario-Quebec border.

James Haselden, 34, who works in a renovated 1875 building in Cleveland, was ordered to evacuate when the building started swaying. People stood across the street and waited for any more shaking.

“I felt the building just kind of shake a little bit and the wall kind of moved a little bit,” Haselden said while waiting to return to work.

on the sidewalk for the all-clear.

He saw no damage but heard plaster cracking and watched as lighting fixtures “kind of waved a little bit.”

The U.S. Geological Survey received reports from people who felt the earthquake across Ohio, including in Columbus, Toledo, Cincinnati, Dayton, Cleveland, Akron and Youngstown.

Brenda Simpson, a receptionist at Antonelli College, an art college in downtown Cincinnati, was sitting in her chair on rollers when the building seemed to move and her chair moved about two inches.

“Everything moved, like the whole building,” she said. “It was kind of like you were in a boat on the water.”

She said people throughout the seven-floor building felt it, and the director decided to evacuate. The college has an enrollment of about 300 but is on summer break.

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Associated Press Writers Dan Sewell and Lisa Cornwell in Cincinnati contributed to this report.