By CEDAR ATTANASIO
Associated Press

EL PASO, Texas (AP) - Five earthquakes centered near a remote area of West Texas have rattled the region. The U.S. Geological Survey says the first tremor registered at a magnitude 3.0 Thursday near Mentone, in Loving County on the New Mexico border. The largest was a magnitude 5.0 about six hours later. No damages or injuries have been reported. Loving County is sparsely populated but full of truck traffic serving the oil drilling industry in the surrounding Permian Basin. Geologists say thousands of earthquakes in recent years have been linked to the underground injection of wastewater from oil and gas production.

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