By Dakota Antelman — [email protected]
Yes, the earth did move.
A magnitude 3.8 earthquake rattled parts of New England, including Concord, Monday morning.
The quake, felt at about 10:22 a.m., was centered just off the coast of York, Maine, according to the United States Geological Survey.
In a statement, Concord police called the quake a “minor event” and urged residents to avoid calling unless it was to report an injury or property damage.
Capt. Brian Goldman said there were no injuries or damage immediately reported in town. All the calls the department received were “curiosity questions,” he said.
Not all the calls went to police.
As the news spread, Hill Street resident Valerie Tratnyek phoned The Concord Bridge to ask what happened, musing that it might be “the biggest one we’ve ever had here.”
Tratnyek said she was in her husband’s office when the tremor started. She was sitting next to a cabinet with glass and worried it was going to break.
The USGS had collected more than 23,000 reports of shaking as of about 11:30 a.m. and classified the motion as moderate in some places.
The earthquake’s effects spread well into northern New Hampshire and as far south as Nantucket. The USGS “Did You Feel It?” visualization showed reports from Massachusetts trickling in from as far west as Springfield.
Though damaging earthquakes are rare, the Northeast has shuddered before. The USGS documented three earthquakes between magnitude 1.3 and 1.7 in Massachusetts in 2024.
Though there are no documented earthquakes with epicenters under Concord, Acton has had two since 1978, including a magnitude 1.3 event in 2016.
In April of last year, a magnitude 4.8 quake in New Jersey startled millions of people throughout New England and the Mid-Atlantic region.
12:02 p.m.: This breaking story has been updated.
