Musicians react to Fourth of July California earthquake

Quake was centered in the Mojave Desert but felt around the region

A large Fourth of July earthquake rattled much of Southern California and Nevada on Thursday, causing musicians to tweet about it. A 6.4 temblor, centered in Searles Valley, CA, about a 140 miles Northeast of LA in the Mojave Desert, was felt across the region from Los Angeles to Tijuana to Las Vegas and Reno. Many musicians in the area took to social media to share what they felt.

Reba McEntire was in Vegas where she is sharing a residency with Brooks & Dunn at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace. She was watching coverage on the news and shared, “Wow! I felt it in my hotel room in here in Las Vegas! Very scary!”

Lana Del Rey shared, “That was a huge one.”

Charlie Puth didn’t feel the quake as he was shopping for sage oil. “Largest earthquake to hit Southern California since 1992, and Adam and I are in Earthbar asking about different types of sage oils totally unaware of any earthquake.”

Mariah Carey tweeted, “I was like… Do I roll out of bed and get to the doorway? I’m from New York, I can’t handle this!”

Robin Thicke wasn’t home, but tweeted his thoughts. “Away with this beauty for the holiday. Hope everyone back home in LA is safe from the earthquake. Have a good 4th everyone!”

The temblor rocked the area just after 10:30 am PT with a preliminary magnitude of 6.6 before it was downgraded to a 6.4. Dozens of aftershocks have occurred in the area following the quake with more to be expected. It is the largest earthquake to hit Southern California in 20 years and nearly as large as the devastating 6.7 Northridge quake struck in 1994 causing billions of dollars in damages and many deaths.

The USGS says, the location of the earthquake falls within the Eastern California shear zone, a region of distributed faulting associated with motion across the Pacific: North America plate boundary, and an area of high seismic hazard. However, it isn’t on the San Andreas Fault and is not expected to affect it.

Over the past 40 years, eight other M5+ earthquakes have occurred within 30 miles of today’s earthquake. The largest was a 5.8 event on September 20, 1995, about 8 miles to the west-northwest of today’s event, which was felt strongly in the China Lake-Ridgecrest area, and more broadly from Los Angeles to Las Vegas.

The majority of the damage has been reported in and around Ridgecrest, CA, 11 miles west of the epicenter, where it caused several fires, roads to crack and the evacuation of Ridgecrest Regional Hospital and several apartment buildings.

Buddy Iahn
Buddy Iahn

Buddy Iahn founded The Music Universe when he decided to juxtapose his love of web design and music. As a lifelong drummer, he decided to take a hiatus from playing music to report it. The website began as a fun project in 2013 to one of the top independent news sites. Email: info@themusicuniverse.com