Earthquakes in New Jersey are Ramapo's Fault

There are earthquakes in New Jersey.

Tonight at 10:34 pm EST a 2.9 earthquake shook Morris County, NJ (around the same time, coincidentally, my dog flipped out like John Travolta in Phenomenon). The earthquake was caused by movement around the Ramapo Fault (I have lived in NJ my whole life and didn't know it existed).


According to the Earth Institute at Columbia University,

"The Ramapo Fault is part of a system of north-east striking, southeast-dipping faults, which are mapped from southeastern New York to eastern Pennsylvania and beyond. These faults were active at different times during the evolution of the Appalachians, especially in the Mesozoic when they served as border faults to the Newark Basin and other extensional basins formed by the opening of the Atlantic Ocean approximately 200 million years ago."

I can't find News 12 on my TV, so I'm not sure the extent of any damage caused by the quake, but I hope that everyone is alright.

For instructions on what to do during an earthquake, visit the FEMA website.