San Francisco Bay Area residents woke up to buzzing phones around 8:06 a.m. on Thursday after receiving an emergency alert warning about a 5.9-magnitude earthquake in Nevada, near Dayton, Nevada and east of Lake Tahoe. Many people immediately searched online for updates such as “earthquake near me,” “earthquake today,” “earthquake California,” “earthquake Reno,” and “earthquake Nevada today.”
But moments later, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) officially confirmed that the alert was a false alarm — no earthquake occurred.
USGS Confirms False Earthquake Alert
According to USGS spokesperson Steven Sobieszczyk, the reported 5.9 earthquake in Nevada never happened:
> “There was no magnitude 5.9 earthquake near Carson City. We are investigating why the alert was issued.”
The erroneous report briefly appeared on the USGS earthquake list but was removed by 8:23 a.m. The alert was also pushed widely through the MyShake early warning system, which normally sends notifications for quakes magnitude 4.5 and above.
First Time Such a Major False Alert Occurred
Angie Lux, a project scientist at the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory, confirmed this type of false warning is unprecedented:
> “We can say that there was no earthquake and we’re looking into what happened.”
Had a real 5.9 earthquake today struck the region, people in areas as far as San Francisco, roughly 270 km away, might have felt very light shaking.
No Activity Reported in Nevada
Authorities in Lyon County, Nevada, where the quake was supposedly centered, did not issue any local alerts. Searches for “earthquake Reno,” “earthquake Dayton NV,” “Nevada earthquake today,” “Dayton Nevada earthquake,” and “Reno earthquake today” increased rapidly as people tried to confirm what was happening.
People Still Searching: Was There an Earthquake Today?
Despite the false alarm, many users continued checking online for:
earthquake near me
earthquake California today
earthquake Reno
Nevada earthquakes
Dayton NV earthquake
5.9 earthquake today
earthquakes today
earthquake California
earthquake now
The quick removal of the alert by the USGS confirms that no earthquake occurred in Nevada or California during that time.
Conclusion
The Nevada 5.9 earthquake alert that reached thousands of phones across California, including San Francisco and Sacramento, was completely false. Both USGS and MyShake are reviewing the issue to prevent similar alerts in the future.
Residents are advised to rely on official updates from USGS and verified emergency channels for accurate earthquake information.
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