Event: the Metro Rail Bhavan

People gather outside the Metro Rail Bhavan building as tremors were felt in the city and adjacent districts of West Bengal, in Kolkata, on February 27, 2026. | Photo Credit: PTI Strong tremors were felt in Kolkata and adjoining areas in West Bengal after an earthquake of 5.5 magnitude on the Richter Scale jolted parts of Bangladesh on Friday (February 27, 2026).Panic-stricken residents vacated their buildings and ran out to the streets, waiting for the tremors to pass while also anticipating aftershocks. The earthquake occurred around 1.22 p.m. on Friday (February 27, 2026) and lasted for several seconds. Though the epicentre was in Bangladesh, strong tremors were felt in multiple districts across the State, including North 24 Parganas, Hooghly, and Howrah.“I left my lunch and ran after I felt my chair shaking,” said an office worker from south Kolkata. Many like him were seen rushing out of offices and residential buildings as a precautionary measure. The epicentre was roughly around 90 km from Kolkata at the Bangladesh border. Many felt their ceiling fans swing and windows rattle due to the impact of the tremors.A building in Ganesh Chandra Avenue reportedly tilted, while one building in Lake Town developed cracks due to the impact.Windows of a building in Bashirhat, North 24 Parganas district, were damaged. In the same district, a house reportedly collapsed in Minakhan, 40 km from the epicentre. Many buildings were also damaged in the area. No injuries have been reported so far.The damage caused by the tremors is yet to be analysed by the State government and concrete numbers are awaited. “Within the Bengal region, there are embedded fault zones, including the Sylhet Fault and the Calcutta-Mymensingh Hinge Zone, that can accumulate stress from plate motion over millions of years and then release it suddenly, producing an earthquake.…