Los Angeles: An earthquake with a magnitude of 4.4 was strongly felt on Monday afternoon (US time) from the Los Angeles area all the way to San Diego on the US-Mexico border, swaying buildings, rattling dishes and setting off car alarms but no major damage or injuries were immediately reported.

Monday’s quake was centred near the Los Angeles neighbourhood of Highland Park, about 10.5 kilometres northeast of Los Angeles’ City Hall, and about 12.1 kilometres below the surface, the US Geological Survey said.

The quake was felt from greater Los Angeles south to San Diego and east to the Palm Springs desert region, according to the USGS community reporting page. A small number of reports were filed from the southern San Joaquin Valley about 160 km northwest of LA.

It shook a medical building, a live interview on ESPN was interrupted, and the ground swayed in Anaheim, where Disneyland is located in Orange County. On X, the former Twitter, ESPN host Timothy Legler posted video of himself in the studio as it began to shake.

Dishes rattled in the storied L.A. neighbourhood of Laurel Canyon, home to many celebrities, and TV news helicopters showed water spilling from an upper floor of Pasadena City Hall, an ornate domed structure dating to 1927 and seismically retrofitted in the 2000s.

But this quake served more as a reminder of what could happen in a state where a huge population lives above active fault lines.

“Having lived through the Northridge earthquake (magnitude 6.7 in 1994), today’s tremor made me flash back to what we know are lifesaving rules during an earthquake: drop, cover, and hold on. It was also a reminder to us all that we live in earthquake country and we need to be prepared,” said Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger.