Earthquake off Kohala rattles isle residents

A small earthquake shook Oahu last night, but there were no reports of damage and no threat of a tsunami, officials said.

The temblor that struck at 8:10 p.m. was centered between Maui and the North Kohala Coast of the Big Island and had an estimated magnitude of 3.2, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Many residents felt the quake in Kaneohe, Kailua, Hawaii Kai and as far as downtown Honolulu and Mililani. "I was sitting on my rocker chair, and it slid on the floor," a Kaneohe resident said. "It felt like a car hit the house. I was afraid to go outside."

A Mililani resident who lives in a high-rise said her apartment shook for several seconds. "I lived in California for 18 years," she said. "It sure felt like an earthquake."

"I imagine it's just some creak of the poor, long-suffering lithosphere under the weight of the Hawaiian Islands," said geophysicist Gerard Fryer of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. He said the quake was likely unrelated to the nearby Mahukona submarine volcano, which extends into the ocean from the western flank of the Big Island near Kawaihae.