Earthquake Felt In Metro Detroit
SOUTHFIELD (WWJ/AP) - A 5.8 magnitude earthquake centered northwest of Richmond, Va., shook much of Washington, D.C., was felt in Michigan.
The phone in the WWJ Newsroom was ringing off the hook with calls from people across Metro Detroit who felt a shake, just before 2 p.m., Tuesday.
Sherrie Jackson was at the Southfield Library on the third floor.
"We literally started feeling the floor just shaking up from under us, and I just realized after about five seconds that it was really an earthquake," said Jackson.
WWJ listener Dan Kunert felt it in Warren.
"I'm on the third floor of our City Hall building, at Twelve and-a-half and Van Dyke, and everybody in our office felt out desks and our chairs wobble," he said.
Hear WWJ's breaking news coverage:
Breaking News: Earthquake
WWJ Sports Reporter Rob Pasco said he felt the quake at his high rise office at the Town Center in Southfield.
"Sometimes even when people are walking, if they come close to your room your stuff might move a little, just depending on how much foot traffic there is," said Pasco.
"But this time you could tell that there was really something weird, because it happened twice where I'm sitting at my desk and I felt my microphone start to giggle a little, like the equipment in front of me," he said.
WWJ AutoBeat reporter Jeff Gilbert was sitting in a car in Dearborn when he felt the vehicle move back and forth.
"I thought maybe there was something wrong with the engine and, just when I shut it off, apparently that's when the earthquake stopped," said Gilbert. "Then I restarted it and nothing was shaking. It was just a very gentle rocking motion," he said.
Residents in Birmingham and Ecorse also reported feeling the quake.
The U.S. Geological Survey, which initially reported a magnitude of 5.8, said the earthquake was 3.7 miles deep. Shaking was felt at the White House and all over the East Coast, as far north as Rhode Island and New York City, and as far south as Chapel Hill, N.C. Parts of the Pentagon, White House and Capitol were briefly evacuated. (More from CBS News, at this link).
The quake was in Mineral, Va., in Louisa County.
Marlene Paulson, a flight attendant from Wyandotte, was at a restaurant in Arlington, Virginia at the time of the quake.
She described the scene as "unreal."
"Everything just started shaking. We had to hold onto the counter to make sure we didn't fall off our stools," Paulson told WWJ.
"The other flight attendant that I was with, we looked at each other and we looked around, and people were just like going crazy, things are falling down, there's people running and pushing their strollers with their babies," she said. "It was like a horror movie."
Paulson said she was supposed to fly out of Virginia Tuesday afternoon, but her flight was delayed because of the earthquake.
WWJ listeners are talking about it on Facebook. Join the conversation, here.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
