Earthquake shakes parts of Kent
An earthquake has shaken parts of Kent, damaging buildings and disrupting electricity supplies.
Homes in five streets in Folkestone had to be evacuated because of structural damage including cracked walls and fallen chimneys.
The tremor measuring 4.3 on the Richter scale struck at 0819 BST and experts said its epicentre was a few miles off the coast in the English Channel.
One woman was taken to hospital with a neck injury.
The Kent incident is the largest recorded in Britain since an earthquake in Dudley in 2002.
British Geological Survey (BGS) seismologist Roger Musson said the tremor was around 4.3 on the Richter scale, with an epicentre 7.5 miles off the Dover coast.
"This is by no means a complete surprise," he said. "There have been earthquakes in this location before. Two of them have been some of the biggest earthquakes ever to affect Britain. The first was in 1382 and in 1580 a quake with a magnitude of about six killed two people in London. There were also smaller tremors in 1776 and 1950 in the area, which were in the "low fours" and on a similar scale to the one today. It was a matter of time before we had another earthquake here," he said.
(Bron)
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