Minor 5.8 earthquake shakes Cayman Islands

Another small earthquake struck in the Caribbean, early this morning in the Cayman Islands.

No injuries or significant damage has been reported from the quake, as was the case with recent earthquakes in Venezuela, Argentina and Guatemala. The USGS recorded the quake at a magnitude of 5.8 on the Richter scale when it hit at 9:23 am, 30 miles southeast of Grand Cayman Island. While the quake was relatively mild, reminders of the recent events in Haiti made residents skittish:

“The whole building was rocking,” said Junior Elliott, 30, who was delivering water bottles to a four-story office building near the harbor in George Town, the capital.

“Everybody scrambled, trying to get out. They couldn’t use the elevators, so they went down the stairs.”

Some phone systems were temporarily disrupted, but no calls to emergency services were reported. Cayman building codes require structures to be built to withstand not only hurricanes, but earthquakes as well.