5 Earthquakes Hit Northern California

Five small earthquakes shook California’s Contra Costa County on Friday morning, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

ABC7 reported that one of the earthquakes registered as a 3.1 on the Richter scale. The quake hit at 12:41 a.m. in Oakley.

Five minutes later, a 2.8-magnitude earthquake hit the same area. There were also 2.2, 2.0, and 1.9 quakes in the area shortly afterward.

There were no reports of damage or injuries.

It comes after a study discovered a 15-mile-long “structure” in the San Andreas Fault line.

The so-called Durmid ladder structure could be ground zero for the “big one” along the fault. Researchers said there is a 75 percent chance it would occur in both southern and northern California within the next 30 years.

“This newly identified Durmid ladder structure is a voluminous, right-reverse fault zone that broadens across Durmid Hill around rotating domains of regularly spaced, left- and right-lateral cross faults,” the study states.

The U.S. Geological Survey’s Dr. Walter Mooney explained the nature of the discovery to KRON4.

“If you have a ladder and you break a rung or a step, then the ladder begins to deform, and if you break another rung, well I wouldn’t want to be on that ladder because the whole thing, both sides could go,” Mooney said. He said that the far southern end of the San Andreas Fault is due for a large earthquake.

Watch Next:

“I Was a Communist Slave”

A story of tragedy, faith, and resistance in the face of brutal totalitarianism, Memoir of a Communist Slave is one man’s journey to uncover what he believes has held him and his people hostage for too long.