5.8-Magnitude VA Earthquake Leaves Aftershocks 10 Years Later

VIRGINIA/DC — A 5.8 magnitude earthquake rattled Virginia and D.C. in the early afternoon of Aug. 23, 2011, prompting people to flee from their office buildings across the region and wonder what had happened.

The 10-year anniversary of the strongest earthquake ever recorded in Virginia and the strongest temblor recorded east of the Rocky Mountains since 1944 is bringing back memories of shaking buildings and brief moments of fear and uncertainty.

The earthquake, which lasted just under a minute, caused cracks in the foundations of homes. Heavier damage was reported closer to the epicenter of the quake in the town of Mineral, about halfway between Charlottesville and Fredericksburg. In Northern Virginia, when people arrived home for the evening, they found the shaking had caused items to shift or fall off shelves.

The earthquake's epicenter, near Lake Anna, knocked both units at Dominion Energy’s North Anna nuclear station offline.

People felt the earthquake from Virginia to the Midwest and New York City to Canada and is believed to have been felt by more people than any other quake in U.S. history. In the decade since the earthquake, the Los Angeles area of California, a region known for regular seismic activity, has not experienced a quake at a magnitude close to the one felt by people in Virginia and D.C.

Cell phone service was disrupted in the hours after the quake, from D.C. to New York City. Telecom companies said their networks had not suffered any structural damage but heavy call volume was disrupting service for some customers.

In the D.C. area, the 5.8 magnitude quake, which was initially measured as a 5.7 magnitude quake, caused damage to iconic buildings, including the Washington Monument and Washington National Cathedral. No deaths or serious injuries were reported from the temblor.

In May 2014, almost three years after the earthquake, the National Park Service reopened the Washington Monument to visitors after conducting $15 million in repairs caused by the earthquake. The monument, though, would be plagued by problems in the years after its reopening.

The earthquake caused $34 million in damage to Washington National Cathedral. In the decade since Aug. 23, 2011, the National Cathedral has conducted about $15 million in work, with completion of repairs expected to take at least another decade. The cathedral is hoping to raise another $18 million as part of its restoration work.

Construction of the cathedral, the sixth-largest cathedral in the world, began in 1907, and completion of the cathedral’s west towers in 1990 marked the end of 83 years of construction.

The earthquake also damaged Union Station in Washington, causing chunks of plaster to crumble and break free from the historic Main Hall and Concourse area ceilings.

The earthquake struck a few minutes before 2 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 23. Office buildings in the D.C. area began to sway and chairs began to shake. People asked each other if they felt the shaking — and once they realized what was happening, many evacuated and moved away from their buildings in case debris started to fall.

The earthquake, with an epicenter in central Virginia, occurred less than six months after the devastating earthquake and tsunami that crippled Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear station. The Japanese disaster caused public interest in nuclear power safety to intensify.

At Dominion Energy's Lake Anna nuclear complex, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission required the company to conduct extensive tests to determine if the reactors were safe to continue producing electricity. Three months after the quake, the NRC allowed the two units at the North Anna nuclear complex to come back online.

In D.C., engineers inspected Nationals Park on the afternoon of Aug. 23, 2011, and declared it had not been damaged by the earthquake. After a 21-minute delay in the start of the game due to the earthquake, the game was played that night, with the Nationals losing 2-0 to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Many people speculated the earthquake had been caused by hydraulic fracturing. Major earthquakes had hit Ohio and Oklahoma shortly before the Aug. 23, 2011, temblor that experts attributed to the deep underground disposal of fracking waste. But experts determined fracking had not caused the Virginia earthquake, given the closest fracking operations were more than 150 miles away in West Virginia.

Dozens of aftershocks occurred in the days after the Aug. 23 earthquake, with the strongest, a magnitude 4.5 aftershock, felt by residents in Northern Virginia and D.C., and as far away as New England, Georgia and Illinois, a couple mornings later.

What are your memories of the Aug. 23, 2011, earthquake? Share them in the comments section.