Earthquake strikes Surrey as residents report feeling homes shaking

The quake happened at 1.19am on Saturday, according to a seismograph from the British Geological Survey.

Several people reported on social media that they had felt the tremor in the Crawley area.

One Twitter user said: "Did an earthquake just happen in Crawley? My whole flat just shook underneath me!", while another added: "Just looked at the sensors around the Gatwick area on BGS's website and it confirms we did have an earthquake at 1:19. Lasted about a second or 2 but woke me up..."

The magnitude of the tremor is not yet clear.

It follows a series of earthquakes in the Surrey area in February, when four tremors were recorded in the space of a fortnight.

Concerns were raised that the quakes were the result of nearby oil and gas exploration.

Stephen Hicks, seismologist at Imperial College London, said at the time that while scientists were "keeping an open mind", there was "still no available evidence which points towards the triggering by man-made activities".

He said: "It is most likely that these earthquakes are natural - due to small tectonic stresses occurring on old geological faults caused by stresses from our nearest plate boundaries in the Mid-Atlantic and Mediterranean."

A 3.0-magnitude earthquake hit Newdigate, Surrey, on February 27, which followed a 2.0-magnitude tremor on February 19 and 2.4 and 0.2 quakes on February 14.