Magnitude 5.8 Earthquake Shakes Western Montana

Updated 5:20 a.m. 07/06/17:

Some Montanans were shaken awake at about 12:30 am by an earthquake with an epicenter about six miles south-east of Lincoln.

Randy Baldwin, a geophysicist with the National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado said, "the magnitude on the quake was a magnitude 5.8, and it occurred at a depth of about 13 kilometers, which is a little over 6 miles."

The Lewis and Clark County Sheriff’s office says no damage or injuries have been reported.

The USGS’s Baldwin says that, in the last hundred years, there have been 16 earthquakes of magnitude five or greater within a 300 kilometer radius of today’s quake. He said there were at least a dozen aftershocks of magnitude 3.5 or greater, and that there may be more to come.

"When you get a quake of 5.8 that’s shallow like this, you can usually expect aftershocks for a period of weeks," Baldwin said. "That will probably go on for some time. There’s always a chance you could get one of equal or ever larger size, but as a general rule, the aftershocks decrease with magnitude over a period of time."

Baldwin says it does not appear that the quake outside Lincoln was related to the recent swarm of earthquakes that’s been reported north of the town of West Yellowstone.

We'll have more on this story as more information becomes available.

Update 07-06-17 01:10 a.m.:

A magnitude 5.8 earthquake shook Montana and parts of neighboring states early Thursday morning. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the quake was centered just south of Lincoln. We have no reports of injuries due to the earthquake at this time. Shockwaves are still being felt with decreasing intensity in parts of western Montana.

People from across the northwest took to social media to discuss what they felt and where they're located.

Here are some of those responses from twitter.

Check back here, or tune in to Montana Public Radio for updates to this story later in the day.