McHenry Earthquake 2012

A minor earthquake Tuesday night in McHenry County shook some northern suburban residents but did no damage, officials said.

The earthquake happened at 9:54 p.m. about 3.2 miles underground near McHenry, roughly 45 miles northwest of Chicago, according to the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Earthquake Information Center.

The seismic event measured just 2.4 on the Richter scale which qualifies it only as a minor earthquake, said Shengzao Chen, a geophysicist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colo.

Officials have received no reports of damage or injuries, Chen said. Residents probably only felt the ground shake for a few seconds.

The last earthquakes in our region happened in 2010, when separate 3.8 and 2.7 magnitude quakes struck on the Illinois side of the border, he said.

Officials earlier Tuesday had initially placed the epicenter just over the Wisconsin border, but new information shows the quake happened on the Illinois side.