At 21:58 GMT (23:58 PM) on Tuesday night, a magnitude 5.4 earthquake jolted Crete island. The USGS reported the center of the quake 35km NNE of Palaikastro, Greece.
Moderate ground shake was reported from Sitia and few places in the eastern part of Lassithi prefecture. Here in Heraklion, some 66 miles west of Palaikastro, the effects were relatively light with only a few seconds of light ground shake. The earthquake emanated from a depth of 57.3 km, and so far no damage was reported from the far east of the island.
Crete has been hit by quite a few fairly powerful earthquakes in the last few weeks. The strongest of them was a 6.0 magnitude event which occurred two weeks ago 34 miles offshore of Kissamos between Crete and Kythera Island.
