A magnitude 4.7 earthquake just north of Malibu rattled Southern California on Thursday.
The temblor struck at 7:28 a.m. and was felt across the region. Significant damage is not expected from an earthquake of this magnitude. A magnitude 2.8 aftershock occurred nearby two minutes later.
The earthquake epicenter was closest to the Malibu fault, said seismologist Lucy Jones, a Caltech research associate. Initial analysis suggests the quake had a 40% chance of associated with the Malibu fault and a 46% chance of associating with the Anacapa fault.
Earthquakes of this magnitude rupture only a relatively small section of fault, perhaps a matter of 100 yards or a few hundred yards. As such, these modest earthquakes can often happen on small faults that are not associated with faults that are much larger and mapped at the Earth’s surface.
“Light” shaking, as defined by the Modified Mercalli Intensity Scale, was felt in Malibu, Thousand Oaks, Agoura Hills and Calabasas. Light shaking disturbs dishes, windows and doors, makes cracking sounds in walls, and can feel like a heavy truck has struck a building.
In Thousand Oaks, the shaking lasted a few seconds.
“Weak” shaking was felt over most of the Los Angeles metropolitan region, including downtown L.A.; Santa Monica; Long Beach; the San Fernando, San Gabriel and Antelope valleys; Orange County and the Inland Empire.
People along the L.A. County coast felt notable shaking. Some people in Redondo Beach and Long Beach felt shaking for a 10 seconds. In Redondo Beach, a person felt the shaking begin small and then intensify, but nothing fell from shelves. In Long Beach, a resident felt a shake and a roll.
Near the Los Angeles International Airport, an apartment building in El Segundo shook and curtains swayed.
There have been more noticeably felt earthquakes recently in highly populated areas of Southern California. But that fact doesn’t help predict whether a larger, destructive earthquake is expected to occur sooner than later, earthquake experts said.
Over the last 65 years, Jones said, there were an average of eight to 10 independent sequences of earthquakes with at least one magnitude 4 earthquake or greater. In some years, there’s just only one or two of those earthquakes; the highest number was 13 of those earthquakes, in 1988. Thursday’s earthquake is the 14th earthquake of magnitude 4 and above in Southern California so far this year, Jones said.
“So yes, this is a more active year than we’ve had in the past,” Jones said. But, she said, “we can’t quite say yet that whether or not that it is actually statistically significant to be seeing this.”
Another earthquake in the Malibu area was felt on Feb. 9. The magnitude 4.6 earthquake was felt across a wide swath of Southern California.
Thursday’s earthquake moved in a horizontal, side-to-side motion, also known as “strike-slip motion,” Jones said. The other type of movement that can be felt in other earthquakes in Southern California are upward motions on a dipping fault.
Some residents were alerted by the state’s earthquake early warning system.
Shortly after the earthquake, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said on X that the city’s fire department activated its routine survey of the city to assess for damages. At this time all the fire stations are currently conducting the surveys and there aren’t any initial reports of damage so far, said Margaret Stewart, spokesperson for the fire department.
Ventura County is reporting “no reports of damage or other impacts to infrastructure.”
The quake was centered in the Malibu hills off Kanan-Dume Road around Ramirez Canyon.
Times staff writers Luke Money, Iliana Limon Romero, Ruben Vives, Richard Winton and Steve Henson contributed to this report.