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\"PHOTO:
Eric Garcetti/Twitter
PHOTO: Los Angeles Mayor, Eric Garcetti, shared this photo on his twitter account on Jan.2, 2019.
>

\"Angelenos should have every chance to protect themselves and their families when there's a major earthquake,\" he also said in a press release. \"We created the ShakeAlertLA app because getting a few seconds' heads-up can make a big difference if you need to pull to the side of the road, get out of an elevator, or drop, cover, and hold on.\"

\"PHOTO:
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images, FILE
PHOTO: Students at Bryant Elementary School take cover under their desks during an earthquake drill as part of the Great ShakeOut event, Oct. 18, 2018, in San Francisco.
>

The app is the nation’s first publicly available mobile earthquake warning system but is only effective for Los Angeles County. Garcetti hopes to expand the app's capabilities to the entire state of California.

The app’s release comes after a decade of research by the USGS and a $260,000 donation from the Annenberg Foundation in 2017.

“Earthquakes are a fact of life in Los Angeles, a challenge we'll always have to face. That's why early earthquake warnings must also be a fact of life — on our phones and on our tablets the very moment they're available,” Wallis Annenberg, the CEO and president of the Annenberg Foundation, said in a statement.

The last earthquake above 5.0 that affected Southern California occurred on Aug. 5, 2018, near the Channel Islands. The quake was logged as a 5.3 but caused no major damage because its epicenter was located in the water off the coast rather than on land. Some areas of Los Angeles still felt the shocks.

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