Updated: 11:30 PM

By the Caribbean Journal staff

A 4.0-magnitude earthquake lightly shook the British Virgin Islands Thursday, according to the United States Geological Survey.

The quake, the epicentre of which was located approximately eight miles north-northeast of Tortola, occurred at around 1:42 PM at depth of 40 kilometres.

That is about 48 kilometres east-northeast of Charlotte Amalie in the US Virgin Islands. There were also a number of reports of shaking in the United States Virgin Islands.

In a statement, Elton Lewis, director of the Virgin Islands Territorial Emergency Management Agency, reminded residents that the Virgin Islands is in a seismically active region.

There were reports of weak to light shaking across the British Virgin Islands.

There have been a number of similarly-weighted earthquakes in the Caribbean in the last few months, led by a pair of 5.1-Magnitude earthquakes in the Dominican Republic and Anguilla.