East Coast Earthquake Caused No Infrastructure Damage, Higher Cell Traffic

People were abuzz about the east coast earthquake that stretched from North Carolina to Toronto.

The 5.9-magnitude earthquake was centered in Mineral, Va. but it was felt throughout the east coast. The earthquake, the most powerful to hit the metro Washington region since 1875, didn't cause any major structural damage according to early news reports, but it did cause people to chat up on their cell phones and see if their families were okay.

According to the CTIA, the Wireless Association, there was an uptick in cell phone voice traffic immediately after the earthquake.

The industry's infrastructure appears to be intact, but because many wireless consumers are using the networks, we are experiencing higher than normal traffic. In these high volume instances, there can be delays. We encourage people to send text messages and emails to contact their loved ones until volume returns to normal, a spokesperson for the CTIA said in a statement.

All of the major U.S telecom companies, Sprint, Verizon and AT&T, all reported spikes in cell phone traffic following the earthquake.

We are currently experiencing an intermittent mass calling event as is expected following an incident of this nature, a Sprint spokesperson said around 4 pm eastern.

Like the CTIA, the companies said there was no structural damage following the earthquake. They were encouraging people to send text messages as well.