Molong, the place of many rocks (and shakes): New earthquake data revealed

The heart of the Cabonne shire has emerged as a little earthquake hot spot after the town was rocked, somewhat, by a couple of tremors over the course of the last year.

Data released by Geoscience Australia revealed the Central West region was hit by 14 earthquakes in 2023.

Two of those emerged as being close to Molong.

Shortly after 3pm on January 9, 2023 Molong was hit by a magnitude 2.6 earthquake. The next tremor was over 11 months later, on November 23. It was slightly bigger at 2.8 in magnitude and recorded south west of Molong.

The largest earthquake felt across the region in 2023 was at Crookwell, which recorded a magnitude 3.2 quake on June 6.

The south-west of the Central West is a particular hot bed for small earthquakes.

Boorowa recorded four throughout 2023. The largest two each recorded a magnitude of 2.4. The smallest two hit readings of 2.1 each.

Generally, earthquakes around a magnitude of 2 are only felt by a few.

Earthquakes around a magnitude of 3 can be felt, and are often likened to the vibrations caused by a passing truck.

Anything around the magnitude of 4 mark will be noticeably felt by many. Dishes can rattle and the sensation will be more akin to a heavy body striking a building,

Orange recorded one earthquake in 2023. It was a 2.9 magnitude tremor on August 9.

Orange's largest earthquake over the last decade was a 4.3 magnitude earthquake in April 27. It hit about 25 kilometres south west of Orange.

Taking out the numbers from 2023, Orange has recorded 139 earthquakes recorded within a 100km radius of the CBD in the last 10 years.

Geoscience Australia Senior Duty Seismologist Hugh Glanville said the earthquakes across the region aren't linked. He said they're a random distribution with a few earthquakes happening close in time in a similar region.

He said normally there's more activity in the Central West than we've seen in 2023, too.

"It's actually less than average for the year so far. On average over the last 10 years we have recorded 32 earthquakes a year," he said.