Separately, in California, a court case regarding one labor regulation has the potential to trigger a seismic event among employers.

FORBES: The Disastrous Effect Of One Labor Regulation Intending To Protect Workers

Several other non-nuclear power generators along the East Coast were tripped, meaning they were automatically shut down by the seismic event.

FORBES: Power Prices Spike after East Coast Earthquake

The Magnitude 6.3 tremor killed more than 160 people and shattered a city already reeling from a previous seismic event in September.

BBC: Christchurch quake mapped from space

The Wednesday night blast shook houses 50 miles away and measured as a 2.1-magnitude seismic event, according to the United States Geological Survey.

CNN: SHARE THIS

Hosni Mubarak's resignation as president of Egypt, after thirty years of authoritarian rule, is a major seismic event in the unstable Middle East.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: How to make Egypt safe for democracy

The most seismic event of the crisis to date, the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers last September, demonstrated the costs of letting a big financial institution collapse.

ECONOMIST: Rebuilding the banks

Groups of locals sit in pavement cafes in the capital city of Nicosia, anxiously watching state television, waiting for the next move, waiting for the next development in a seismic event which has rocked the Cyprus economy to its very core.

CNN: Fear, despair as bailed out Cyprus faces uncertain future

The answer is yes -- each one of them is designed to withstand an earthquake, without releasing any radioactive materials at all, up to the maximum projected seismic event at that plant, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group in Washington.

CNN: Nuclear disasters: Is the fear realistic?