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3.9 earthquake wakes up southwestern Germany

An earthquake of magnitude 3.9 shook Germany's Schwäbische Alb region near early this morning at 0.25 am local time.
The epicenter was located approx. 50 km south of Stuttgart city in SW Germany and the quake occurred at a shallow depth of only 9 km. Within 20-25 km of the epicenter, the tremor was felt clearly and woke many people up. One user reported that "it started with a bang, followed by moderate vibrations that rattled furniture, doors, shelves and so on. Weak shaking was perceived by some in even 50-80 km distance.
There were no reports of damage, nor should a quake of this magnitude have caused any.
Quakes that can be felt are comparably rare in Germany, but do occur from time to time, especially in the country's southwestern part. Most of them are related to active tectonic movements of the Rhine Graben, separating the French Vogesen and Germany's Schwarzwald.
A larger quake of magnitude 5.3 happened in almost the same area near the town of Albstadt on 3 September 1978. It was one of Germany's strongest earthquakes in recent decades and damaged almost 10,000 houses, caused some towers and chimneys to collapse and similar damages. However, today's tremor is not comparable in size, as a magnitude 5.3 is approx. 50 times stronger than today's magnitude 3.9 even. Each step in magnitude signifies a difference in energy of 30 times.

Earthquake data:
Date & time: Mon, 30 Nov 23:25 UTC
Magnitude: 3.8
Depth: 8.0 km
Epicenter latitude / longitude: 48.37°N / 9.01°E
Primary data source: GFZ