Powerful Caribbean earthquake shakes buildings in Jamaica, Cuba — even downtown Miami

Jan. 28--A powerful magnitude 7.7 earthquake struck 86 miles northwest of Jamaica on Tuesday afternoon, sending seismic energy that could be felt throughout the northern Caribbean and as far as coastal Florida. The earthquake and ensuing aftershocks opened sinkholes on the Cayman Islands and swayed buildings from Jamaica to downtown Miami.

Construction workers in Kingston kept laboring on a rooftop and schoolchildren took shelter under their desks as the ground shook. Mirrors vibrated in Sancti Spíritus, Cuba, where residents reported feeling such tremors for the first time in their lives. A man in the Bahamas thought he was having a heart attack. Hanging lamps in Miami skyscrapers swayed, leading some confused office workers to believe their lunches may have made them ill. Government offices closed early.

As of Tuesday evening, there were no reports of loss of life from the earthquake.

At 2:10 p.m., a strong earthquake struck about six miles beneath the surface in the open water between Jamaica and Cuba with more force than the 2010 earthquake that devastated Haiti, a quake that occurred only 15 miles away from Port-au-Prince and left an estimated 316,000 dead. On Tuesday, residents of southern Haiti reported feeling tremors.

Tuesday's earthquake struck along the border between the Caribbean and North American tectonic plates, a crack that stretches from Hispaniola to Guatemala. One scientists explained that both plates, massive slices of the earth's surface, scraped each other as they moved in opposite directions.

"It's a slip plate fault like the San Andreas," said Grenville Draper, an earth sciences professor at Florida International University. "North America moves a bit west and the Caribbean to the east."

Multiple tremors in northern Caribbean

All three of the Cayman Islands experienced the effects of the initial earthquake, which occurred 80 miles northeast of George Town, the capital. Though no injuries were reported as of Tuesday evening, multiple aftershocks kept residents and government officials on high alert late Tuesday. A Red Cross shelter opened on Huldah Avenue in George Town, and drivers were advised to stay off the roads as much as possible.

Several of the aftershocks occurred within 50 miles of Grand Cayman, whose residents felt the impact of five tremors through the afternoon. The most powerful of them registered a 6.1 magnitude about 35 miles southeast of Grand Cayman, just before 5 p.m. Officials said a damage assessment is underway, but there have been only a few reports of structural damage to buildings. Late Tuesday, one Miami Herald reader reported some damage to roads, water lines and some properties.

A government spokeswoman confirmed that several sinkholes opened, and that emergency operations personnel will be working through the night to assess damage and monitor road safety.

"The possibility of aftershocks remains and members of the public are advised to stay vigilant and stay tuned to official sources of information including the Hazard Management website, Facebook and Twitter pages," Suzette Ebanks, a government spokeswoman said in an email.

In Cuba, people across the island reported feeling the quake, even in Havana. Enrique Arango Arias, the head of the Cuban National Seismological Service, told el Nuevo Herald that tremors were felt more strongly in Santiago de Cuba and other eastern provinces. There were no reports of injuries or major structural damage, save for some cracked walls.

"The alarm is constantly sounding warning that there is a new earthquake," Arango said. "There is no major material damage, only some cracks in homes in the municipalities closest to the epicenter such as Niquero and Pilón."

Mercedes Ferrera, a volunteer at the Archdiocese of Santiago de Cuba, said the tremor was stronger than what she had felt in the past.

"It was very strong, and people here are sensitive about this issue," she said over the phone from Santiago de Cuba, the island nation's second largest city. She said she noticed this one was "too long" because she had time to run down two flights of stairs from her office at the Archdiocese to the street while the earth was still shaking.

"Everyone who could run to an open, secure space in the streets did so," she said. The religious building did not suffer damages, and she was making calls to other old churches in the area to find out their situation.

In Jamaica, residents also reported tremors lasting about a minute. But in Kingston, while buildings rattled, some workers on the roof of a five-story building continued their activities despite the shaking. Desmond McKenzie, the local government minister in Jamaica who oversees the Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management, said his office was collecting whatever information it could.

"So far there are no reports of any damage that we can say of concern," he told the Herald.

Richard Thompson, head of Jamaica's Office of Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Management, later told the Herald that there were "some minor damages in some western parishes."

In the Bahamas, the tremors were felt all along Bay Street in downtown Nassau. James Smith, former minister of state for finance and current chairman of investment management firm Colina Financial Advisors Ltd., said he initially thought he was having a heart attack.

"You felt the movement in the building but very slight," he said. "Of course having never experienced anything like that before, you spend a long time trying to figure out what's happening."

Smith said the tremors were small and could not have lasted more than a minute.

"It definitely shook the building but not in a dramatic way," he said.

Erica Wels, the spokeswoman for Bahamas Prime Minister Hubert Minnis, said "as a precautionary measure all government offices were closed today," following the tremors.

Quake felt in Miami and the Keys

The earthquake's force traveled several hundred miles away to South Florida, causing downtown Miami skyscrapers to sway, cutting the workday short for employees in several buildings and spurring some road closures. In the Florida Keys, lights flickered and boats rocked a bit more than usual.

Across the region, authorities reported no injuries or damage. County administrators at first couldn't say Tuesday whether a water-main break near the intersection of Bird Road and Southwest 84th Avenue was a result of seismic activity. "It turned out to be a broken air-release valve," said Jennifer Messemer-Skold, a spokeswoman for the Water and Sewer Department.

In Miami, employees streamed out of several downtown offices, including the 29-story administrative headquarters of Miami-Dade County's government, the Stephen P. Clark Center. Workers also left the Dade County Courthouse, Miami-Dade Children's Courthouse, Overtown Child Support Division and Lawson E. Thomas Courthouse Center.

Some workers chose to leave, but the county did not order an immediate evacuation, said Tara Smith, head of the county's Internal Services Department. But by 3 p.m., the city's Fire Department ordered a full evacuation "as a precaution," Smith said.

Police closed at least one block between Southwest Third Avenue and Second Avenue and redirected traffic to surrounding streets. Dozens of city employees gathered outside the government center for over an hour and a half after the evacuation. Close to 4 p.m., agents with vests identifying them as counterterrorism agents asked staff members to back away from the building's front plaza.

One city employee, Angel Rivera, said he was having lunch nearby when he got a call that the building where he works was being evacuated.

"The only thing they told us was that they're making sure that the building's structure is safe," said Rivera. "That's all I know."

Dozens of people crowded the sidewalks and plaza in front of the county building. Nearby residents came outside to watch the group of people who had emptied out of their offices. Despite the unusual scene, Miami employees continued to huddle and talk over unfinished business outside, making plans about when to reschedule interrupted afternoon meetings. Mostly, it was the traffic-clogged parking garage exits and building evacuations that inconvenienced them.

"I'm just trying to figure out how I'm gonna get home," said Taminka Robertson, who works downtown but lives in Brownsville. To get home, she takes the Metrorail at the Stephen P. Clark Center, but no one was being allowed inside or around the building.

By 4:30 p.m., officials were no longer blocking access to the center and sidewalks had emptied out.

For some, the sight of objects shaking in their offices made them wonder if it was something they'd eaten. Lawyer Eli Stiers was in his office in the penthouse of Museum Tower, 150 W. Flagler St., across from the Miami Dade Cultural Center. Around 2:20 p.m. or so, he felt something strange.

"I'm sitting in my office and started to feel a very slight sway," Stiers said. "I didn't know whether I had some bad sushi for lunch or what. But then I looked at my office door and saw it teetering on its hinges. I asked people in the office if they felt it. When people stopped for a second and registered what was going on, they said yes, the building is moving."

They called the building manager, who had also felt the tremor. An evacuation of the building was ordered.

"We said, Let's get out of the building. We all went downstairs," he said. "We didn't know whether it was an earthquake or a sinkhole or what."

The quaking lasted two to three minutes, Stiers said. A short while later, the fire marshal gave an all clear and everyone went back to work.

"It's crazy that we would feel this that far away," Stiers said.

Although unusual, it makes sense that the waves from such a large earthquake reverberated all the way to Miami. Ryan Gold, a research geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, said it is "completely reasonable for people to feel it in Florida."

"It's a very large earthquake which can produce a lot of seismic energy," he said.

The Geological Survey tracks reports from people who felt shaking because of the earthquake. The map shows that reports came in from across the state with several dozen in the Miami Beach area. There were at least two reports in Tallahassee and one near Pensacola. Reports were called in from people on both the east and west sides of the state.

While people may have felt some shaking, Gold said, the effects were likely not strong enough to cause any damage. He said there could be some aftershocks near the epicenter, which also has the potential to be felt in South Florida.

Miami Mayor Francis Suarez said city officials felt the quake in the city's emergency operations facility, located a short walk away from the county government center. The center was already operating due to the influx of visitors for Super Bowl 54, which will be played Sunday at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens. The players of the San Franscisco 49ers, no strangers to earthquakes, are staying at the JW Marriott Marquis downtown.

"We have inspectors ready for property owners who want to make sure the integrity of their buildings have not been compromised," Suarez said.

In the Keys, the quake was felt by people up and down the the 120-mile archipelago, according to social media posts solicited by the Miami Herald/FLKeysnews.com, but mostly in the Lower Keys to the Middle Keys city of Marathon.

Jennifer McCrory said she felt the ground shake while on the third floor of the Custom House art and historical museum on Front Street. Susie Parpana was on her boat when she felt it and said the vessel shook for about 20 seconds. Corrine Ross said she didn't feel anything, but the lights inside the Key West Winn Dixie went out twice while she was grocery shopping.

Several people reported feeling the quake's effects in Marathon, and at least one person who responded to the Miami Herald's request for comment said she felt the rumblings in Key Largo.

"I wasn't sure what it was till now," Leyton Ladd-Carr posted.

People in office buildings in a populous Miami suburb, Kendall, also felt the swaying and evacuated. Daisy Lenis was scanning documents at the Datran office complex in the Dadeland area when her boss insisted she felt the room move.

"We thought she was crazy," Lenis said. "Apparently, she wasn't."

Her boss was vindicated when someone came on the building loudspeaker to ask all of the occupants to leave, saying "This is not a drill -- there's been an emergency."

Miami lawyer Eric Hockman was taking a nap in a recliner in his hospital room on the Coconut Grove waterfront when he said he felt some movement around him.

"I felt this gentle rocking back and forth. My first thought was: 'Who is moving my chair?'" said Hockman, a patient at Mercy Hospital, where he's undergoing rehab after surgery. "Didn't last long, but my next thought was 'Earthquake? Nah, not in Miami.'"

In an interview by text, Hockman said he only realized what had happened when he checked social media.

"I didn't think much more about it until I saw the tweets and said to myself, 'Hey, I did feel that!'"

El Nuevo Herald staff writers Mario J. Pentón and Miami Herald staff writers Douglas Hanks, Charles Rabin, Carli Teproff, Devoun Cetoute, Gwen Filosa, David Goodhue and Andres Viglucci contributed to this report.

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