The american obsession with the word "earthquake" ia fascinating to me. I have never understood why, otherwise intelligent and eloquent native english speakers

The american obsession with the word "earthquake" ia fascinating to me. I have never understood why, otherwise intelligent and eloquent native english speakers, choose to call small vibrations of tectonic plates as "earthquake" instead of what in theory should really be the more appropriate word: Tremors French, Spanish and German languages do not make this same error. Is english at fault? ? Am i wrong? Or is there more to it?