Monday, Aug. 23, 2021, marked the 10-year anniversary of a 5.8 magnitude earthquake near Mineral, Virginia.
According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), no lives were lost in the earthquake, but the disaster caused between $200 to $300 million in property damages.
The earthquake occurred in what is known by scientists as the Central Virginia Seismic Zone and was was felt by millions of residents in the eastern U.S.
“The 2011 earthquake in Virginia was significant in raising awareness of east coast earthquake hazards and the importance of research to understand when and where earthquakes can occur,” David Applegate, USGS associate director for natural hazards said in a statement. “Damaging earthquakes do not strike the eastern U.S. often, but the potential consequences of not understanding and planning for such events with their widely distributed shaking could be severe. The next significant earthquake on an eastern U.S. fault may not occur for hundreds of years, yet there is a small chance it could happen at any time.”
The USGS's “Did You Feel It?” website received almost 150,000 responses within minutes of the event from states all along the east coast and west to the Mississippi River Valley.
The Mineral earthquake demonstrated how much farther ground shaking can extend in the eastern U.S. than in the western U.S., according to the USGS. The eastern U.S. has older rocks that are harder and often denser, and faults on those rocks have had more time to heal, allowing seismic waves to cross them more efficiently when an earthquake occurs.
August 2021 also happens to be 135 years to the month since the largest historical earthquake in the eastern U.S. struck Charleston, South Carolina, in the evening of Aug. 31, 1886. This earthquake was felt throughout most of the central and eastern U.S. More than 100 people died in the quake and many buildings collapsed or were heavily damaged.
