WEST COLUMBIA, S.C. — Seismic data now suggests that hours before an earthquake rattled a Chesterfield County community on Friday, another one was detected closer to home for Columbia-area residents.
The U.S. geological survey reports that a magnitude 1.9 earthquake was determined to be under a portion of West Columbia and not far from the border with Cayce.
Maps show the epicenter to be in a commercial and residential area bounded roughly by Dreher Road, Huckabee Road, and Taylor Street not far from Platt Springs Road.
But, despite its location in a relatively populated, the earthquake, so far, has only reportedly been felt by about five people according to the USGS "Did You Feel It?" survey.
That isn't totally out of the norm, however, as quakes below a magnitude of roughly 2.5 are hard if not impossible for the average person to feel.
Meanwhile, it turns out the earthquake actually preceded another in the day which was initially thought to have broken a nearly month-long drought of seismic rumbles in the state - the last of which was another magnitude 1.9 in Kershaw County on Jan. 20.
The confirmation of the earlier West Columbia-Cayce rumble now makes an earthquake in Chesterfield County the third to impact the state since that time.
At a magnitude of 2.4, that earthquake west of the town of Jefferson and east of the Lynches River has reportedly been felt by about 54 people as of Saturday morning.