TEESSIDE was rocked by an earthquake in the early hours of this morning.
The earthquake , measuring 5.2 on the Richter scale, was centred on Market Rasen, in Lincolnshire, but people across the regiomn said they felt buildings shaking shortly before 1am.
Many said the tremors had been strong enough to wake them.
Lee Rushworth, 29, from Hartlepool, was woken up when the tremor made his sofa shake against the bedroom wall of his ground floor flat.
"I thought someone was banging on the wall behind me but there was no-one there," he said.
Seismologist Dr Brian Baptie of the BGS said: "This is a significant earthquake for the UK and will have been widely felt across England and Wales."
The BGS said it records around 200 earthquakes in the UK each year - an eighth of which are able to be felt by residents.
It said earthquakes of this size occur in the mainland UK around every 30 years but are more common in offshore areas.
Today's quake is the largest since 1984 when an earthquake measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale shook the Lleyn Peninsula of north Wales and was widely felt across England and Wales.