UPDATE: Officials: No known fatalities, house to house search underway in Ridgecrest after 7.1 earthquake - KSBY San Luis Obispo News

(UPDATE) 8:37 a.m. — House to house inspections are underway in the Ridgecrest area but no known fatalities or major injuries have been reported, the Kern County Fire Department announced Saturday morning.

At a news conference at 8:35 a.m., Kern County Fire Chief, David Witt, stated the “mutual aid system is working” as crews descend on the hardest hit areas of Ridgecrest and Trona.

Witt says inspectors are out in the field at this time gathering information but there are no major building collapses and nobody trapped that they are aware of right now. There were minor injuries, damage to homes, cracks in roadways, and gas lines ruptured but no major gas lines were broken.

Witt did not give an update on the number of homes burned in fires after quake struck.

Power has returned to nearly all of Ridgecrest but the cleanup is just beginning 12 hours after the strongest earthquake to hit in 20 years.

Officials report no issues at the Lake Isabella Dam but a more thorough assessment will be completed today.

Highway 178 is open but Witt warned travelers to avoid the canyon.

Another news conference is expected around 10:30 a.m. from officials in Ridgecrest.

(UPDATE) 7:42 a.m. — As daylight improves, the plan for additional assessments for damage from California’s largest earthquake in 20 years is under way.

New fires are breaking out in #Ridgecrest this morning due to the earthquake. Mobile homes are especially vulnerable right now. @RedCrossLA has a shelter open at the Kerr McGee Community Center, currently with 130 evacuees. More soon from our WCK team. #ChefsForCalifornia pic.twitter.com/zjhM2YjqDV

— World Central Kitchen (@WCKitchen) July 6, 2019

Cal OES says the emergency center remains staffed 24 hours a day. Officials plan to provide an update when new information is verified.

(Original Story) 7:16 a.m. — The largest Southern California earthquake in nearly 20 years has jolted a vast area from Sacramento to Mexico, cracking buildings, setting fires, wrecking roads but only causing minor injuries.

The 7.1-magnitude quake struck at 8:19 p.m. Friday and was centered 11 miles (18 kilometers) from Ridgecrest, the same area of the Mojave Desert where a 6.4-magnitude temblor hit just a day earlier.

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Several thousand people in Ridgecrest were without power Friday night, and there were reports of cracked buildings, homes off foundations and fires stemming mostly from gas leaks or line breaks.

With daylight Saturday, new assessments will take place in the hardest hit areas.

While officials did not provide details about the number of injuries, Ridgecrest Police Chief Jed McLaughlin said that all had been minor. A shelter in place order was issued at an area hospital as a precautionary measure, he said.

Also a precaution, some hospital patients still hooked to IV’s were wheeled out of the Ridgecrest hospital but then returned inside. The hospital remained on backup power as many throughout Ridgecrest were left in the dark.

Local roads were assessed for damage even as a rockslide closed a state road in Kern County. It was cleared and re-opened a few hours later.

Conditions through SR178 in the Canyon pic.twitter.com/l3rnYGhutJ

— CHP Bakersfield (@BakersfieldChp) July 6, 2019

California Gov. Gavin Newsom reached out to officials in Washington, D.C. for additional support.

“Earlier this evening I formally requested a Presidential Emergency Declaration for Direct Federal Assistance to further support emergency response and recovery in impacted communities,” he said in a statement late Friday night.

The California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES) has activated its State Operations Center in response to Friday’s 7.1 earthquake in Ridgecrest.

Mark Ghilarducci, the director of the governor’s Office of Emergency Services, said early Saturday that a number of fires had been reported as a result of gas leaks and line breaks.

In the town of Trona, a community of about 2,000 people about 25 miles northeast of Ridgecrest, there were reports of a building collapse, power outages and gas leaks, Ghilarducci said.

UPDATE: A home in Trona shows the damage caused by the July 5th earthquake. pic.twitter.com/N8SluA7sd7

— 23ABC News (@23ABCNews) July 6, 2019

Seismologists warned that large aftershocks were expected to continue for days or weeks.

Residents across the Central Coast reported feeling the shaking but fire officials in San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties had no reports of damage or injuries here.

A Guadalupe man was visiting Ridgecrest when the earthquake struck. His story here.

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