4.7 quake hits near Lake Elsinore, but no damage is reported

A moderate earthquake struck in the Santa Ana Mountains on Sunday morning, shaking parts of four counties but causing no reported damage.

The 10:29 a.m. quake, which had a magnitude of 4.7, was centered eight miles northwest of the city of Lake Elsinore, near Santiago Peak in the Cleveland National Forest, Caltech seismologist Kate Hutton said.

About 50 people contacted the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department dispatch office in the first hour after the jolt.

“We got a nice ride,” said Sheriff’s Department communications officer Dana Murphy. “People called us and asked us, ‘Was that an earthquake?’ We said, ‘Yup, it was.’ It was a good one. It felt bigger than a 4.7. It felt like a 5.”

The shaking was most intense between Mission Viejo and Riverside, according to U.S. Geological Survey maps, although light shaking could be felt in parts of Los Angeles.

Myong Kim, 50, owner of Latte Express coffee shop in Lake Elsinore, said it was her first earthquake since moving to California from New York about a year ago.

“It was a little shaky and I was scared. I never had this kind of experience before,” she said.

Heather Saxxon, 27, a server at the shop who has experienced earthquakes before, took it in stride.

“The whole building shook a little, but nothing fell down,” she said. As soon as it was over, she resumed serving coffee.

At the Orange County Sheriff Department’s communications center in Silverado Canyon, near the city of Orange, Lt. Ted Boyne said the quake “wasn’t rolling, it wasn’t shuddering, you just bounced a little bit. I called my wife, just to make sure the house was OK.”

Sheriff’s Investigator Denver Saucier felt the tremor at his home near Lake Elsinore.

“It was just a rumble, a shaking of the house for three to five seconds,” Saucier said.

“To me, it was just your typical quake, almost like an aftershock,” he added.

The quake ruptured a fault line at a depth of 1.6 miles in canyons north of Trabuco Peak. A magnitude 2.5 aftershock struck two minutes later.

marla.cone@latimes.com

Times staff writers David Haldane and Deborah Schoch contributed to this report.