Naval aircraft testing over the Atlantic Ocean created the sonic booms that caused rumbles and house-shaking that could be felt from the southern Jersey Shore to Long Island and the Connecticut coast and prompted thousands of tweets and 911 calls from residents thinking they were feeling the tremors of an earthquake.

Officials with the Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland said they were conducting testing of F-35C fighter jet over the Atlantic Ocean Thursday afternoon and that some of the aircraft performed maneuvers that could have caused sonic booms.

The sonic-boom fueled tremors were reported first in southern New Jersey — near Cape May County — before moving up the coastline sometime before 2 p.m. Within an hour residents in Amityville, Long Island, Staten Island and southeastern Connecticut all also reported the shaking.

U.S. Geological Survey officials say the booms — created when an aircraft breaks the sound barrier by traveling more than 768 mph — were first recorded 8 miles south of Jackson, New Jersey. Eight other spikes were reported at multiple stations in southern New Jersey.

(AP)