USGS Confirms 16 Earthquakes Stuck Near Area 51 in Last 2 Days: See Map of Locations

An earthquake and 15 aftershocks have struck a remote stretch of southern Nevada near the highly restricted Area 51 military installation, United States Geological Survey (USGS) research geologist Christopher DuRoss told Newsweek. The earthquakes, plotted on a USGS interactive map, appear concentrated across southern Nevada, with the first quake striking on Wednesday morning, followed by more than a dozen, weaker tremors occurring roughly 28 miles east of the classified test site northwest of Las Vegas.Nevada is among the most seismically active states in the country, crisscrossed by faults linked to the Basin and Range geological province, where the Earth’s crust is slowly stretching and breaking apart. Earthquakes are relatively common in the region and are typically driven by natural stress changes underground, according to seismologists. Still, the proximity of some recent tremors to Area 51, long shrouded in secrecy and public fascination, has once again prompted questions online—despite the lack of evidence that the classified military site or any human activity is connected to the earthquakes.The tremors were confirmed to be earthquakes, DuRoss told Newsweek, as were the aftershocks, which occurred at a depth consistent with earthquakes. Earthquake Strikes Near Alamo, Nevada: What We Know The first quake, a magnitude