The earthquake struck at Burra, north of Adelaide
© Geoscience AustraliaThe earthquake struck at Burra, north of Adelaide.
An earthquake which has been felt widely across parts of South Australia is the biggest to have occurred in the state in the past decade, a seismologist says.

Geoscience Australia estimates the magnitude-4.3 earthquake happened between Burra and Clare, in the state's Mid North, at 3:23pm.

People felt shaking in Adelaide office and apartment buildings, as well as in the Adelaide Hills and Yorke Peninsula.

Geoscience Australia seismologist Hugh Glanville said it was the largest earthquake in the state for the past 10 years.

He said there were no reports of damage was so far, but it was felt from Mount Barker to Jamestown.

"It is possible for minor damage from a magnitude-4 but it's reasonably unlikely for this earthquake," he told ABC Radio Adelaide.

He said the earthquake happened at a "very shallow" depth of 3 kilometres.


The northern Mount Lofty Ranges are known for seismic activity, with 300 tremors occurring within 100km of the latest rumble over the past decade, Mr Glanville said.

"There's quite a lot of active fault lines but most of them are buried," he said.

The earthquake was originally classified as a 4.2 but later upgraded to 4.3.

The Joint Australian Tsunami Warning Centre said there was no threat of a tsunami from the earthquake.

Adelaide's largest earthquake struck in 1954 and measured 5.5 on the Richter scale.

A 3.8-magnitude earthquake hit Jamestown in 2011.

ABC Radio Adelaide listeners flooded in with calls and text messages reporting they felt the tremor.

Matt from Maitland, on the Yorke Peninsula, was in Los Angeles for the 1992 earthquake.

"I definitely knew straight away what it was," he said.

Eldred from Hoyleton, on the Adelaide Plains, said it lasted for at least 10 seconds.

"I know it definitely wasn't a truck driving past because it shook too much," he said.

Tam from Kent Town said she felt her bed rock.

"I thought the wobble was my cat jumping on the bed, but he was in a different room," she said.