A magnitude 4.8 earthquake has hit New South Wales, causing windows to smash and a chimney to fall over.
The quake – revised down from a magnitude 5 – hit Denman, 120km north-west of Newcastle in the upper Hunter region. It struck at 12.02pm on Friday, with a depth of 10km, and is the largest to hit the area in 20 years.
More than 2,000 people have reported feeling tremors, including some more than 200km away in Sydney. People also reported feeling it as far south as Canberra, in the north to Armidale and west to Dubbo.
NSW police said the State Emergency Service had responded to reports of minor infrastructure damage, but there were no reports of major damage to infrastructure or buildings.
The SES received 21 calls reporting minor infrastructure damage within two hours after the quake hit. A spokesperson said a building in Muswellbrook had its windows blown in, and there were reports a chimney had fallen off a dwelling in Maitland.
The SES is contacting dam owners in the Hunter region to ensure the integrity of dams.
The earthquake was felt at the strongest intensity about 20 minutes drive from Denman, and around Muswellbrook, according to Geoscience Australia’s map.
A woman in Muswellbrook said she felt multiple shocks around midday.
“There were two [and it was] not just a tremor, it was a massive earthquake,” she told Sydney radio 2GB.
“The whole house rattled, and then about half a minute later, it rattled again.
“I actually thought it was my new kitten knocking down some things.”
One person in Scone, about 45 minutes drive from Denman, wrote on social media the tremors had cracked the walls.
Well that was the first time I’ve really felt an earthquake!! The house shook, the walls cracked. Wild! pic.twitter.com/EcNvVCzTTb
— Anna (@AnnaKEdwards) August 23, 2024
A man more than three hours’ drive away, at Cranebrook in western Sydney, also felt multiple shocks but said the earthquake “wasn’t massive”.
A number of Sydney residents jumped on social media to express disbelief they had just felt an earthquake.
“Did we just have... a baby earthquake??” wrote one person on X.
“Earthquake in Bondi. That’s a first!” wrote another.
A person living in Newcastle posted on social media that their house shook.
Sydney earthquake just scared the shit outta me I can’t believe this pic.twitter.com/IKkgOT2G8k
— ash 🎬 (@_ash_mac) August 23, 2024
Senior seismologist from Geoscience Australia Dr Hadi Ghasemi said two aftershocks followed the initial earthquake – the first a magnitude 3.3 and then a magnitude 2.9.
“There is always a possibility that aftershocks could continue for the weeks to come,” he said, “but as a general rule of thumb the largest aftershocks tend to occur [after the main earthquake].”
The epicentre is around 10km from the nearby Mt Arthur coal mine. Dr Ghasemi said it wasn’t unusual for earthquakes to occur near mines as sites are typically located close to fault lines.
“The fault lines provide the passage for the fluids to go through them and deposit valuable minerals, but the same process can also increase the likeliness of earthquake occurrence,” he said.
He said there had been more than 150 seismic events in the area over the past 20 years, but this was the largest one.
The Bureau of Meteorology said there was no tsunami threat from the earthquake.
