The earth shook in the American East Coast on mid-Tuesday and prompted hundreds of office worker to rush out from swaying buildings, in what authorities described as the biggest earthquake to hit the region in the last 70 years.

The rumbling was felt from Georgia to Maine, according to media reports, and the U.S. Geological Survey said on the same day that the quake measured at magnitude 5.8, with the epicentre traced at about 135 kilometres southwest of Washington.

The shaking was so intense that U.S. officials ordered the evacuation of employees working at the White House, the Capitol area and Pentagon though media reports as of late Tuesday have indicated that no deaths or serious injuries were recorded by authorities on cities affected.

Also, initial reports released by the White House revealed that the country's East Coast area, which experts said is rarely hit by powerful tremors, sustained no major damages in properties and infrastructures, which include airport and nuclear facilities situated in the region.

According to The Associated Press, two nuclear reactors at North Anna Power Station were automatically shut down by the facilities' safety system while the Reagan National Airport outside Washington absorbed minor damages but continued its normal operation.

Following the initial shock that gripped many employees with fear, authorities in Washington briefly allowed workers to return to their stations and retrieve their belongings, then all non-essential staffs were allowed to go home, reports said.

Reports furnished by the USGS showed that the powerful quake rattled areas from the northern state of Maine down to South Carolina, plotting the wide coverage of the disturbance created by the underground plates.

The White House said that U.S. President Barack Obama immediately cancelled his scheduled golf game after the earthquake struck and gathered his key officials for an emergency conference call.

Those who attended were heads of the Homeland Security, the National Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, according to reports by AP.

The USGS raised a yellow alert after much of the shakings, which indicated that authorities were anticipating likely domestic damages and manageable economic disturbances in the East Coast region that saw its last major quake during the 1944 New York tremor.