Las Vegas ? Despite an early morning earthquake that rumbled nearby, federal officials insisted Friday that the site of a proposed national nuclear waste repository in the Nevada desert was safe.

No damage or injuries were reported after the magnitude 4.4 temblor struck at 5:40 a.m. The earthquake was centered about 12 1/2 miles southeast of the Yucca Mountain site and 75 miles northwest of Las Vegas, according to the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colo.

The earthquake went unnoticed on the Las Vegas Strip but was felt in Pahrump, 40 miles southeast.

It also reverberated in Washington, where the Senate is due by July 26 to vote on whether to entomb highly radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain.

“The earthquake is a wake-up call for the U.S. Senate,” said Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., who raised the specter of radioactivity contaminating groundwater if a quake were to strike an active repository.

The House has already voted to support President Bush’s selection of Yucca Mountain as a storage site.

The Energy Department plans to bury 77,000 tons of commercial, industrial and military nuclear waste in a grid of tunnels.