– By Tiffani Ireland –

If you live on the Westside of Edgefield County and felt the floor beneath you tremble in the wee hours of Friday morning, you are not alone.  When I heard the loud rumble followed by the quick shaking of the floor in my house, I immediately thought, “Earthquake.”  Knowing our area sits on a fault line and not unheard of are small quakes, I did not give the event much more thought.  Then, around 12:30 a.m. Saturday, my husband and I both heard a loud boom which we decided must have been a sonic boom of some sort.

Well, it turns out, both occurrences were indeed due to earthquakes.  According to the National Earthquake Information Center, a 2.8 quake struck near McCormick, SC, early Friday morning, Apr. 26, shortly before 1:15 a.m.  This 2.8 shaker was followed nearly 15 minutes later by a 2.1 quake.  Then again, a little after 11:30 a.m., a 2.2 earthquake was measured.  All three quakes were detected approximately 1 mile from one another.  While located within Lincolnton, Ga., the quakes’ centers were about 9 miles from Plum Branch in McCormick County.

On Saturday, Apr. 27, the NEIC detected a 2.3 earthquake resonating from the nearly the same coordinates as the previous three.  This quake struck at approximately 12:45 a.m.

While there were no calls to the Edgefield County 911 center in regards to these quakes, reports of houses shaking and the sound of a loud boom were reported from several people in the Lincolnton/McCormick area.  According to the NEIC, there no reports of damages as a result of these quakes.