Utah was rattled Friday by another earthquake — the third to be widely felt in less than a month.
The 3.5-magnitude earthquake shook Salt Lake County on Friday evening about 6:32 p.m., with its center on the west side near Magna and West Valley City, according to the University of Utah’s Seismograph Stations.
Both the U. and the U.S. Geological Survey reported it on their websites, noting the tremor was about 5.4 miles deep.
Its origin, though, adds an interesting element: Currently, University of Utah researchers believe that because the Friday quake hit in Magna, it’s an aftershock of the even bigger 5.7-magnitude tremor that hit in the same place in March 2020, in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
(USGS) A map from the U.S. Geological Survey shows the epicenter of a 3.5 magnitude earthquake that occurred in West Valley City, Friday, Feb. 13, 2026.
“We might change our mind in the future. But that’s our initial hypothesis: This could be an aftershock of that event‚" said Katherine Whidden, a research scientist at the U.’s Seismograph Stations.
Aftershocks, she said, can stretch long after a quake — even six years later. And the big earthquake had several before the likely one Friday.
“They can just go on for a long time,” she said.
Typically, seismologists determine if a quake is an aftershock based on the baseline for a fault. And Magna, while it’s started returning to its baseline from the 2020 quake, hasn’t gotten all the way back yet, Whidden noted.
The 2020 quake was the most significant to rumble Utah in recent years, causing up to $50 million in damage mostly to historic brick buildings around the Salt Lake Valley.
Since 1981, the U. notes, there have been 232 quakes of a 2.0 or greater magnitude at that same epicenter. There have already been two smaller aftershocks registered just on Friday’s earthquake, too.
The tremor was nerve-rattling because it comes after two more recent quakes in the state.
There was a 4.7-magnitude quake felt in Utah on Jan. 22. That epicenter was about 6 miles south of the Wyoming state border.
Another quake on Feb. 5 was centered in northern Utah County, near Thanksgiving Point and about 4.4 miles west of Lehi. That one was also a 3.5 magnitude, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Whidden said having three quakes close together like that might cause alarm, but there’s good news: Because those three recent ones were in such different locations, they aren’t related.
“It’s just coincidence,” she said. “This is how a random distribution looks.”
The one that hit by Wyoming, near the Uinta Mountains, in particular, Whidden said, “is in a completely different stress regime.”
People from across the Salt Lake County went on social media Friday to report feeling the quake. And the U. has, so far, received more than 2,800 reports from individuals.
It was felt as far north as Ogden and as far south as Provo. To the east, residents in Park City might have felt it. And to the west, those in Tooele could’ve been a little shaken.
A bout of rumbling was also felt at the earthquake-retrofitted Utah Capitol.
Some people reported seeing objects moving in their houses during the quake. Others said they could hear a loud noise.
Whidden said after any tremor, there’s a 5% chance it is a foreshock to a bigger quake. Those odds decrease as more time passes, though.
The recent rattling, she said, is a “really good reminder that we are in earthquake country.”
She advised Utah residents to be prepared with a 72-hour kit containing food, water and medicine in the event of a larger quake. If a weeklong kit can be prepared, that’s even better.
Families should also draft plans, Whidden said, for what they’ll do in a major earthquake, such as how they’ll reach each other and where they’ll go.
Cell towers are sometimes damaged by quakes, she added, but more likely they’ll be overwhelmed with multiple people trying to call or text at the same time in an emergency.
Utah has long been set to have a massive quake — known as the “Big One” — with a 50% chance of that happening sometime within the next 50 years.