Officials in Northern California’s Humboldt County on Tuesday said two people were killed and another 11 suffered injuries in a 6.4-magnitude earthquake that struck the region overnight, according to a press release from the Humboldt Sheriff’s Office of Emergency Services. “Power remains off for over 70,000 customers in the county. Pacific Gas and Electric Company is actively working to restore power with no estimated time of restoration,” the statement also said.
The quake was centered about 9.3 miles off the California’s remote “Lost Coast” region, striking at a depth of 11 miles. The area is among the more seismically active in the Golden State as it’s north of where the San Andreas fault ends and where the Cascadia subduction zone begins. At 7.3-magnitude, the 1980 Eureka earthquake is tied with the 1992 Landers earthquake in the southern portion of the state as the strongest ever recorded by modern seismography, though the 1906 San Francisco earthquake is believed to have been the most powerful in California history.