Kali­fa Clyne

The re­gion is in a pe­ri­od of el­e­vat­ed earth­quake ac­tiv­i­ty, seis­mol­o­gist Dr Joan Lutch­man said.

Lutch­man said this in a tele­phone in­ter­view fol­low­ing an earth­quake which was felt in T&T and at around 10.24 pm on Wednes­day.

"We have been hav­ing sev­er­al earth­quakes in the re­gion, with the most tak­ing place in the Lee­ward is­lands," Lutch­man said.

In fact, fol­low­ing Wednes­day's earth­quake, there were two earth­quakes with­in hours of each oth­er yes­ter­day, one near Bas­seterre, St Kitts and the oth­er near Mar­tinique.

The first earth­quake near Bas­seterre was a mag­ni­tude 3.8, while the sec­ond had a mag­ni­tude of 4.3.

"The ac­tiv­i­ty is a lit­tle el­e­vat­ed but some­times that i what hap­pens, we go through pe­ri­ods of el­e­vat­ed ac­tiv­i­ty," Lutch­man said.

Lutch­man said Wednes­day's earth­quake took place North of the Paria Penin­su­la, off the coast of Venezuela and was felt as far south as Pe­nal, and in ar­eas such as San­gre Grande and Diego Mar­tin.

"It was a mod­er­ate event. If it was a lit­tle clos­er to us it would have giv­en us quite a shock," Lutch­man said.

"Our is­land is in an ac­tive zone so we will ex­pe­ri­ence earth­quake ac­tiv­i­ty."

By the num­bers

The UWI Seis­mic Re­search Cen­tre pro­vid­ed the fol­low­ing de­tails on Wednes­day's earth­quake.

DATE AND TIME:

2015-04-15 10:24 pm (Lo­cal Time)

MAG­NI­TUDE:

5.4

LO­CA­TION:

Lat­i­tude: 10.77N

Lon­gi­tude: 62.39W

Depth: 10 km

NEAR­BY CITIES:

93 km E of Car�pano, Venezuela

98 km W of Port of Spain, Trinidad and To­ba­go

118 km NW of San Fer­nan­do, Trinidad and To­ba­go