A magnitude 5.5 earthquake hit central Canada this afternoon, rattling buildings from Windsor to Montreal and several U.S. states.
The epicentre of the quake was in Quebec, 61 kilometres north of Ottawa, according to U.S. Geological Survey, and struck at 1:41 p.m.EDT.
The Ottawa newsroom was evacuated at about 1:43 p.m. The Toronto newsroom also shook.
Environment Minister Jim Prentice was doing an interview with CTV at its Ottawa bureau on the 14th floor of the World Exchange Plaza in downtown Ottawa when the tremour struck.
"I was on the air and suddenly my chair was moving," he said afterwards. "Fortunately I was at the end."
The sidewalks quickly filled with workers who decided to evacuate their buildings.
Twitter users as far away as Springfield, Mass. and Traverse City, Mich. reported feeling tremors. A Globe reporter in Montreal said that city also shook.
Within minutes of the tremour, cellphone service in Ottawa was down, possibly because callers had overloaded the system, though the exact cause was not known.
A spokesperson for Toronto EMS said that they've received no calls about any injuries in Toronto.
An eyewitness saw items flying off the shelves at a pharmacy in Gatineau, QC.
“We felt the building shake. It was actually it was pretty serious. It was definitely the strongest quake that I ever felt," said Dennis Choquette, a Globe and Mail online editor based in Ottawa.
The shaking lasted about 15 seconds, Mr. Choquette said.
The severity of the earthquake is not yet known. It is not yet known whether there have been any reports of injuries.
More to come