Earthquake expert weighs in on Wednesday’s earthquake; locals react
EL PASO, Texas -- Wednesday afternoon's earthquake caught many El Pasoans off guard.
"Both of my monitors started shaking, and then my chair also started shaking," said Carlos Maruffo, an El Pasoan.
"I noticed one of my little pumpkins on my table started shaking, and I was like, that seems weird," said ABC 7 Meteorologist Katie Fraizer.
The US Geologic Survey reported an estimated magnitude 5.4 earthquake. The epicenter is 29 miles from Pecos, Texas, in a town called Mentone.
UTEP professor and Seismologist Aaron Velasco said the earthquake we thought was rare wasn't rare at all.
"It's not as odd now as it was in the past and what I mean specifically is western Texas right now has a large number of earthquakes. Nothing of this size is usually below magnitude 3," said Aaron Velasco.
Velasco says an earthquake that was felt in the El Paso region could likely happen again.
"This area of west Texas has had a history now of earthquakes. We know that there’s probably gonna be earthquakes in the future there. We just again the size location, time that's gonna happen we just can’t we can’t predict when it’s gonna happen," said Velasco.
