Where were you when the earthquake hit?

A magnitude 5.9 earthquake struck the East Coast Tuesday, Aug. 23, including the Cape Region. Published reports say the quake could be felt as far north as Toronto and forced the evacuation of New York City Hall and the U.S. Capitol.

Locally, the Sussex County administration building and courthouse on The Circle in Georgetown were also evacuated. The county's emergency operations call center received 200 calls to 911 within the half hour after the tremor. The normal count is anywhere from five to 15 calls an hour this time of year.

The Cape Gazette would like to hear your story if you felt the quake. iMembers can post at the end of this story; other readers are welcome to email reporter Nick Roth at nick@capegazette.com. Videos showing the effects of the quake are also welcome.

Officials say so far, there are no reports of major building damage, although phone service seems to have suffered temporary interruptions.

"It's a unique event which has caused high call volume," said Verizon media relations manager Lee Gierczynski, speaking of landlines. High call volume over landlines sometimes prevents calls from going through, he said. Once call volume subsides, he said, everything goes back to normal.

The earthquake created a buzz around the region.

"We certainly felt it. We were up in the conference room and all the light fixtures and things on the wall were moving," said Nick Benz, chief operating officer of Dogfish Head Brewery in Milton. "Heck, we're not used to having this on our radar."

He said a walk-through of the brewery didn't reveal any structural damage.

The unique event caused confusion among many area residents.

"The whole house started shaking," said Dover resident Catherine Ortiz. "I stood up thinking I was going crazy and it was still shaking. I grabbed my cell phone and ran outside with no shoes. [It was] very scary. I didn't know what to do."

Patti Persia was on the phone with someone in New York at the time of the quake and initially thought someone hit her Milford home with a car.

"The person I was on the phone with said 'Why is my building moving?'" she said. "I asked him 'How did you know that? My house is moving!' Got my heart pumping, that's for sure."

More stories

From Dale Wagner in Venice, Fla.: "I have relatives that live in Rehoboth Beach, and my aunt was in the kitchen and all of a sudden she said it felt like she was dizzy. Then she saw the lights moving on the ceiling. She wasn't dizzy. It was the quake. I talked to her last night and I could hear her voice in a nervous tremble."

Leroy Hazzard of Magnolia, who lives in a home built in the 1700s, had this account: "I was sitting at my kitchen island working on my laptop. The house felt like it was swaying from west to east. I thought a large truck was going by at first, then realized it was an earthquake. It was terrifying since this part of the house has considerable settling and sloping floors upstairs. I really didn’t know if the plaster ceiling was going to come down. In the end, just a few cracks. Two antique clocks in this part of the house stopped at the exact time of the earthquake."

Rehoboth Beach resident Dolph Spain shared the story of his house guest: "I had an out-of-town guest who went to get gas at the Valero gas station on the corner of Route 1 and Rehoboth Avenue Extended. She was stopped, waiting to exit the parking lot when her car started shaking. She could not figure out the cause until she heard the report of the earthquake."

Gregory Schmuck of Ephrata, Pa., didn't let the quake get in the way of his work: "I was working in a two-story building that was built in the 1940s. I was working on some plumbing problems and thought that it got very windy. I looked out the window and there was no wind. The walls of the apartment were swaying back and forth and I figured it was an earthquake. I did continue working and heard on the radio that it was a quake. I did not panic or leave the building like the government workers did. When you have a real job you are inclined to just stay at it."