Ashley McNeil was getting ready for work when she felt it. “I was on the third floor of my dorm room building and it was pretty violent,” said McNeil, who has family ties to Logan County. The freshman nursing major is used to early mornings, but earthquakes just aren’t part of her usual routine. McNeil, who is a student at Southern Illinois University in Edwardsville, was about 150 miles west of the epicenter of the earthquake that struck the Midwest this morning.

“The whole building woke up,” McNeil said. “It was very scary at first.”

The quake — one of the strongest ever recorded in Illinois — occurred just before 4:37 a.m. and was centered about fives miles northeast of Bellmont.

The U.S. Geological Survey initially pegged it as a 5.4 earthquake, which would have topped the previous record of a magnitude 5.3 quake set in 1968. But, the USGS revised that number this morning to 5.2.

That qualifies as a “moderate” quake on the Richter scale, which goes up to 10. About 800 quakes in the 5.0 to 6.0 range occur around the world each year.

This morning’s quake was felt throughout Illinois. Logan County residents also felt a second tremor around 10:15 a.m.

McNeil called her stepfather, Ernie Shaw, 100 miles north in Elkhart. Shaw — and many other Logan County residents — had also felt the earthquake.

“I was in bed getting ready to get up and it just sounded like a bunch of hail hitting my walkout basement cover,” he said. “I thought, ‘Man, we must be getting a storm.’”

“Then the dog started growling” and Shaw realized something else was going on.

“I heard it more than felt it,” he said. “It lasted about 15 seconds.”

The quake was generated by a northern branch of the New Madrid fault zone, the most seismically active zone in the country east of the Rockies.

It produced a series of powerful quakes in 1811 and 1812 that were estimated at magnitude 7.0 or greater, although they weren’t officially recorded. The most powerful quake recorded in Illinois — the 5.3 quake in 1968 — led to scattered damage but neither serious injuries nor deaths. It centered in Hamilton County, about 75 miles southeast of St. Louis.

Even before today’s quake, though, officials were aware of seismic activity in the Midwest. Early next month, agriculture extension officials from various regional states are scheduled to convene an earthquake summit, hosted by the University of Illinois’ extension service.

Summits like that one should help people prepare and learn about earthquake safety, just in case accidents occur.

During this morning’s quake, a Mount Carmel woman was trapped in her home by a collapsed porch but was quickly freed and wasn’t hurt, said Mickie Smith, a dispatcher at the police department.

The department took numerous other calls, though none reported anything more serious than objects knocked off walls and out of shelves, she said.

The quake shook skyscrapers in Chicago’s Loop, 230 miles north of the epicenter, and in downtown Indianapolis, about 160 miles northeast of the epicenter.

U.S. Geological Survey scientists in Denver were examining data about the quake, said geophysicist Carrieann Bedwell.

“This was widely felt, all the way to Atlanta, a little bit in Michigan,” she said.

Residents in Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Louisville and St. Louis also reported feeling the earth shake.

“It shook our house where it woke me up,” said David Behm of Philo, 10 miles south of Champaign. “Windows were rattling, and you could hear it. The house was shaking inches. For people in central Illinois, this is a big deal. It’s not like California.”

Phones started ringing at the Crawford County Sheriff’s Department in Robinson, about 15 miles north of the epicenter, but there were no immediate reports of damage, dispatcher Marsha Craven said.

“They didn’t know if it was the refinery blowing up or an earthquake,” she said, referring to the a local petroleum refinery.

Craven said she’s lived in the area her whole life, and felt a handful of earthquakes, but couldn’t recall one this big.

In Cincinnati, one woman said she felt something that lasted for up to 20 seconds.

“All of a sudden, I was awakened by this rumbling shaking,” said Irvetta McMurtry, 43. “My bed is an older wood frame bed, so the bed started to creak and shake, and it was almost like somebody was taking my mattress and moving it back and forth.”

Johna Todd, a dispatcher at the Edgar County Sheriff’s Department in eastern Illinois, said the quake rattled the area and led to numerous 911 calls, but all to ask why their homes were shaking rather than report damage.

In Frankfort, Ky., Ray Teron was awakened by the quake. But he said his mother, whom he lives with, slept through it.

“It definitely rattled the dishes. It was enough to wake you up.”