A magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck near Ojai on Sunday, rattling the larger Southern California region as residents were dealing with intense rains from Tropical Storm Hilary. The temblor was felt across Southern California and hit at 2:41 p.m.

Scott Thomsen, director of communications with Ventura County Fire, said the department immediately implemented its earthquake plan that involves getting the trucks out of the firehouses.

“So far,” he said, “we have no reports of damage, but we are checking.”

Thomsen noted the quake came just as officials were bracing for Tropical Storm Hilary: “We are in the middle of the first tropical storm since 1939, and we just had an earthquake.”

Earthquake scientists were quick to say Sunday’s earthquake had nothing to do with the arrival of Hilary.

Ojai Mayor Betsy Stix told The Times on Sunday afternoon she had spoken with emergency officials and that, although a power line was reported down and a cellphone tower was damaged, there was very little other damage.


Stix said she was in her home office when the shaking started. Frames on the walls began to rattle, the floor started shaking, and “the cats scattered and ran.” She said, with the tropical storm and the quake, this was a day for the history books.

Shopkeepers in Ojai reported minor damage. At the Ojai Beverage Co. on Ojai Avenue, manager Nick Howard said a $900 bottle of tequila and a few wine bottles had toppled, but the shop had otherwise lost very little in terms of product.

Patty McFall at OVA Arts, a well-known art gallery regarded for featuring work by local artists, said, “We had some damage. We had some pieces fall. Three or four pieces broke.” McFall, a sculptor and jeweler, said that some pieces had survived a tumble in the Arcada Plaza, in the heart of Ojai.

Franz Lidz, a journalist living in Ojai, said the quake came with a calamitous sound of things falling and glass shattering. “It was short, loud and violent. The whole house shook as if a Mack truck had crashed into it,” he wrote in a text to The Times.

“Bernice, one of the family dogs, felt it first,” he added. “She knew instantly that something was terribly wrong. My wife Maggie and I were slower on the uptake, though we realized pretty quickly — 15 seconds? — that we were in the middle of an earthquake. Los angeles Times