Earthquake hits NC 2

Earthquake In
The U.S. Geological Survey confirmed a 5.1 magnitude earthquake Sunday morning, with an epicenter in Sparta, NC., and ripples felt as far away as Raleigh.

Sunday’s earthquake is the largest in North Carolina since 1916, when a 5.2 magnitude quake hit Skyland in Buncombe County.

The earthquake happened at 8:07 a.m. on the border of North Carolina and Virginia near the town of Sparta, said Randy Baldwin, a geophysicist with the National Earthquake Information Center in Colorado.

“This earthquake was a magnitude of 5.1 on a 10-point scale,” Baldwin told The News & Observer Sunday morning. “The information center received more than 6,000 of reports of the earthquake in a 200-mile radius that touches seven states.”

There were no significant reports of damage immediately following the earthquake, but a journalist with WGHP, a Fox affiliate in Greensboro, tweeted photos of damage from inside a home in Sparta. Cabinet doors stood open and glassware was shown shattered on the floor in multiple rooms of the home.