10 Quakes Recorded in North Texas over 2-Day Period

A cluster of small earthquakes has rattled a Dallas-area city over a two-day period.

The U.S. Geological Survey recorded the temblors in the Irving area, including two in the morning on Jan. 7.

No major damage or injuries have been reported in the 10 earthquakes that hit since Jan. 6. USGS reports the magnitudes ranged from 1.6 to 3.6.

Carrieann Bedwell, a geophysicist with the USGS in Golden, Colo., said senior scientists would be investigating the temblors.

“They will be looking at the parameters, magnitude, depth, location of each of the events,” Bedwell said. “Right now we’re calling it a swarm, because we’ve had multitude events happen.”

Bedwell described a swarm as earthquakes approximately in the same location in a matter of a few days or so.

“Earthquakes of this size, like 2s, 3s, can happen pretty much anywhere in the world at any time,” Bedwell said.

The Irving area, with a population topping 250,000, has had more than 25 minor earthquakes since early September, according to Brian Stump, a seismologist with Southern Methodist University.

“SMU’s seismology team is committed to helping North Texans understand more about the increasing number of earthquakes felt in our region over the last few years, most recently near the city of Irving,” Stump said in a statement.

SMU researchers installed a seismometer in Irving on Jan. 5. Other devices were set up earlier near Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport and on the Dallas campus.

Geologists say earthquakes of magnitude 2.5 to 3.0 are generally the smallest felt by humans.