HOMES in Southend shook as an earthquake in the estuary affected the town. 

The tremor hit at about 2.50am this morning in Ramsgate, Kent, but it could be felt across the water in Southend. 

British Geological Survey said it was a 4.2 magnitude and was about nine and a half miles underground. 

A spokesman said: "A few reports have been received from the Faversham, Chatham, Basildon and Southend-on-Sea areas. The most distant reports have been received from Norwich, North Walsham and Cromer."

Seismologists at the British Geological Survey (BGS) confirmed the tremor.

The organisation tweeted: "Prelim data now online ... 4.2 magnitude earthquake nr Sandwich, Kent".

Vikki Petts said: "So we just had a 4.3 magnitude earthquake in Kent and my housemates slept through the entire thing. certainly woke me up!"

Jonathan Tapp said: "Earthquake in East Kent and now can't get back to sleep. Despite months spent in NZ this is my first one that I've felt."

Other agencies initially recorded varying measurements, including the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre, based in Paris, said the earthquake measured 4.3 on the Richter scale.

It tweeted: "M4.3 earthquake strikes 46km SE of Southend-on-Sea (United Kingdom)."

The US Geological Survey measured the quake as magnitude 4.0.

The British Geological Survey said earthquakes similar in size to the one that struck last night happen around every two years in the UK and about 4,500 times a year across the world.

It tweeted: "Today's 4.2 magnitude Ramsgate earthquake is approx 260,000 times smaller than the 7.8 NepalQuake event.

"This morning's earthquake is approx 25km north-east of the 28 April 2007 Folkestone earthquake which had a magnitude of 4.3 ML."

People reported being woken from their sleep, with windows rattling and furniture shaking.

Twitter users however made light of the quake, jokingly posting "devastating scenes" of overturned wheelie bins and garden furniture with messages such as "We will rebuild".

Experts said it was difficult to link the earthquake to a specific fault line.

David Galloway, a seismologist with the BGS, said: "The whole of the UK is criss-crossed by thousands of fault lines but most of them are at depth.

"This means we do not pinpoint a specific earthquake to a specific fault because even if a location is a few hundred metres off it could have been a completely different fault.

"Fortunately we do not live on the plate edges - for example the San Andreas fault in California can actually be seen at the surface, but the faults in the UK are blind and most earthquakes happen at a depth of between 5km and 25km.

 


 

"Earthquakes happen all over the UK - we get some 200 a year on average. One of the scale of this morning's only happen every two or three years."

One resident, in Thorpe Bay, said her house shook and woke everyone up at 2.52am.

  • Did you feel the earthquake? Email emma.thomas@nqe.com