A strong earthquake hit Friday near the Greek capital of Athens, causing residents to run into the streets in fear and firefighters to check for people trapped in elevators.The Athens Institute of Geodynamics gave the earthquake a preliminary magnitude of 5.1 but the US Geological Survey gave it a preliminary magnitude of 5.3.   The Athens Institute says the quake struck at 2:13 p.m. local time (1113 GMT) about 26 kilometres (13.7 miles) north of Athens.The quake sparked limited power cuts and communication problems around Athens and the fire brigade reported receiving calls about people being trapped in elevators. The shock was caught live in the studios of state broadcaster ERT. The Civil Protection Authority said there was no immediate word on injuries or damages, but that police and volunteers north of the capital were carrying out searches for possible damage. The most powerful quake to hit the Greek capital in the last 20 years came in 1999, when a temblor of magnitude 6.0 caused extensive damage and killed more than 140 people. Gerasimos Papadopoulos, the senior seismologist at the Geodynamics Institute said Friday's quake was felt across southern Greece. Subscribe to our YouTube channel: https://bit.ly/2TwO8Gm TICTOC ON SOCIAL: Follow TicToc on Twitter: https://twitter.com/tictoc Like TicToc on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tictoc Follow TicToc on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tictoc Watch all of TicToc’s videos: https://www.tictoc.video/ Listen to TicToc’s podcast: https://apple.co/2D3Vta7 Subscribe to our newsletter: https://bit.ly/2FJ0oQZ TicToc by Bloomberg is global news for the life you lead. We are a 24/7 news network that covers breaking news, politics, technology, business and entertainment stories from around the globe, supported by a network of Bloomberg’s 2,700 journalists across 120 countries.