JEFFERSON COUNTY, Tenn. (WVLT) – Just after 7:00 PM on Wednesday, the phones in the WVLT Volunteer TV newsroom came alive with viewers who said they had just felt an earthquake.

Within 30 minutes, the U.S. Geological Survey confirmed that a 2.9 magnitude earthquake did occur at 7:05 PM. Its epicenter was located in a field about two miles south of Strawberry Plains at the intersection of Barber Road and Hickory Road.

Residents from Knox, Jefferson and Sevier Counties called the newsroom to report the odd experience. One of them was Thomas Rimmer, who was sitting at his computer in Strawberry Plains when the floor underneath him began to move.

"It was just a really loud rumbling,” he said. “It felt like it lifted our house up"

He then visited the U.S. Geological Survey website and learned that what he felt was an earthquake that originated a little more than six miles underneath the earth’s surface.

"It just shocked me because it never really happens out here this way," he said.

Rimmer’s mother was watching TV in the other room. She knew something unusual was occurring when the family Christmas tree started shaking.

"I got up and my dog was going crazy,” said Sandra Rimmer, “so I was trying to calm him down."

The quake was so short that it left people unsure what had happened. Tony McPherson was also in Strawberry Plains when it started and immediately thought it was an explosion.

“There was a big boom then it was a shake,” he said. “My friend was in there cooking and the whole skillet came up."

Much of East Tennessee sits in the Eastern Tennessee Seismic Zone which officially stretches from northeast Alabama to southwest Virginia. It’s made up of several small and ancient faults buried deep below the surface. As far as seismic events go, it's considered one of the most active earthquake areas in the southeast.

In late 1973, a 4.6 magnitude quake rocked Knoxville and remains tied as the zone’s most powerful in recorded history.

The Strawberry Plains earthquake on Wednesday was the third quake recorded in East Tennessee in just four days. It was also the most powerful of the three.