LEBANON, Ore. -- Many in Oregon and Washington are still "shaken up" after a 4.4 magnitude earthquake hit Oregon Friday morning.

It happened at 5:52 a.m. on October 7. The epicenter of the quake was in Lacomb, just east of Sweet Home.

Many in Lebanon said they felt the shake.

"I was sleeping in my camper and I thought some punk was trying to sneak up and shake my camper," said Lebanon resident Dan Canavan. 

Jordyn Meadors works at Sugar Vibes, a local bakery shop. She said she and her coworkers were getting ready to open up the store when it happened.

"At first I thought it was a truck that went by and then the windows were shaking," said Meadors. "We didn't realize what it was until one of our coworkers who lived in California was like, 'I think that was an earthquake.'"

Rebecca Grizzle is the president of the Lebanon Chamber of Commerce and said she also didn't realize what the shake was.

"In that split second, you just don't know what's going on," said Grizzle. "I had just finished my walk and grabbed my coffee and then my couch just started rumbling."

Wyatt King is an insurance agent in Lebanon and also moderates the Facebook group Prepare Lebanon for Emergencies and Disasters (PLEDGE). He said he had a list of questions after the initial shake,

"When I woke up, I thought, 'okay, start the clock, are we going to have the big one? Is it game time?'" said King. "But then everything settled down and I got excited because I knew it would be a time to talk about prepping."

There's been talks of the 'big one,' or the Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake for quite some time. Although it's unknown when exactly this earthquake will hit, experts have said the Pacific Northwest is due for one.

"[The Cascadia Subduction Zone] is a big fault that is a plate boundary between the North American plate between where we reside and the Juan de Fuca Plate, which is off shore underneath the Pacific Ocean," said Oregon State University earthquake geology professor Andrew Meigs. "The Cascadia Subduction Zone is the monster in the room that's last had an earthquake in the 1700's."

Meigs said the earthquake on Friday is nothing like what's to come.

"4.4 magnitude earthquake mans it was a relatively small earthquake but large enough to be felt by people. So it's unlikely to have caused any damage especially given that it was a fairly remote earthquake," said Meigs. "There's an almost unimaginable gap between what today's earthquake was and what the future Cascadia Subduction Zone earthquake will be."

The best thing to do is prepare.

King keeps a Ready America Go bag in his car that has basic essentials he believes everyone should have. This includes nutrients, a water filtration system and a Midland NOOA radio.

Another way people can prepare for the next quake is participating in the annual Great Oregon Shake Out. This year it's scheduled for October 20 at 10:20 a.m.

Watch Jaewon Jung weekdays on KEZI 9 News and catch her behind the anchor desk during our weekend newscasts.

Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items.