Minor Quake, a 3.9, Rattles Inland Empire

The Inland Empire was rattled by a minor earthquake at 8:59 a.m. Tuesday that measured 3.9 on the Richter scale, authorities said. There were no reports of injuries or damages.

The quake was centered about 10 miles south-southeast of San Bernardino and was felt by many residents of the area.

“I felt the house tremble and heard the windows shaking,” said Alma Bise, 51, who lives a few miles south of Redlands and near the quake’s epicenter. “It was over too soon to bother me.”

The Caltech Seismology Laboratory also recorded two smaller temblors, each measuring 2.8 on the Richter scale, at 11:45 p.m. Monday and 12:17 a.m. Tuesday. They were centered about three miles south-southeast of Yucca Valley, laboratory spokesman Robert Finn said.

Finn said the temblors were unrelated and were not aftershocks of the 6.1 earthquake that rocked the Los Angeles area Oct. 1. Finn said it may be difficult to determine exactly which fault the largest of Tuesday’s quakes was on.

“There are lots of faults out there,” he said, adding: “Usually we can’t tell what fault an earthquake is on unless it is big enough to break ground--this one wasn’t nearly that big.”

Finn noted that small quakes are common in Southern California.

“Southern California averages 11,000 earthquakes a year--about 30 a day,” he said, most of which measure less than 2.0 on the Richter scale.