Largest quake in decades rattles California

Associated Press

LOS ANGELES

A strong earthquake rattled a large swath of Southern California and parts of Nevada this morning, making hanging lamps sway and photo frames on walls shake. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries but a swarm of aftershocks were reported.

The 6.4 magnitude quake struck at 10:33 a.m. in the Mojave Desert, about 150 miles northeast of Los Angeles, near the town of Ridgecrest, California. It is the strongest quake to hit the region in 20 years.

The United State Geological Survey initially said it measured at a 6.6 magnitude.

"It almost gave me a heart attack," said Cora Burke, a waitress at Midway Cafe in Ridgecrest, a town of 28,000 people. "It's just a rolling feeling inside the building, inside the cafe and all of a sudden everything started falling off the shelf, glasses, the refrigerator and everything in the small refrigerator fell over."

Video posted online of a liquor store in Ridgecrest showed the aisles filled with broken wine and liquor bottles, knocked down boxes and other groceries strewn on the floor. There was at least one house on fire in Ridgecrest.

Veteran seismologist Lucy Jones said the earthquake Thursday was the strongest to hit Southern California in 20 years.

The previous large quake was a 7.1 on that struck in the area on October 16, 1999, she said.

Jones told reporters at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, that the 6.4 quake centered in the Mojave Desert near the town of Ridgecrest was preceded by a magnitude 4.3 temblor about a half hour earlier.