Earthquake!
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGdyMgvRNEg[/youtube]
We were unceremoniously shaken awake at 3:20 by a 6.0 or 6.1 magnitude earthquake. If you’ve not experienced a major or semi-major earthquake, let me tell you that it’s mostly the noise that assaults you, at least if you’re indoors, and assuming there’s nothing falling on your head. We have sliding mirrored closet doors, which make a lot of noise rattling around. The walls rattle. The roof rattles. Yes, you feel the bed shaking, and if the lights are on, you might notice the lights swaying.
There was a time when I enjoyed earthquakes. They’re generally small enough that there’s no real damage, and it can be kind of fun to feel the earth move around a bit under your feet. What I used to like was how everyone is busy doing their own thing, thinking their own thoughts, and then suddenly for a few minutes, everyone is thinking about the same thing at once. “What was that? Was that an earthquake? I’d say that was a 4.5 at least”, that kind of thing. You can turn on the talk radio stations, and that’s what everyone is calling in to talk about. “My pool was sloshing water for a good 10 minutes after the quake.” “Watch out for aftershocks!” “Remember ’89?” “At least it wasn’t ‘THE BIG ONE'”
That all stopped in San Francisco in 1989, when the Loma Prieta earthquake caused so much damage, and killed so many people. The stories that came out of that one were horrid. I remember thinking that the building I was in was going to collapse with Ted and me inside. That was the first time an earthquake scared me. I don’t generally fear them now, but I don’t like them either.
The earthquake this morning didn’t scare us. But it was loud and unsettling, and reminded us that maybe we need to get on putting together that emergency kit that we so often discuss.
11 Comments
Rain Trueax
I wondered how much you were impacted by it. I’ve been in a few and they can be stomach unsettling. One, as a child, I was outside and dropped to my knees as it felt like it could knock me over. I also traveled to the Bay Area (business trip for my husband) after the big one and saw the huge damage which took years in many cases to totally to fix with some of the older buildings. Scary. Oregon is overdue for a really big one. Hope it continues to stay overdue.
J
Rain, I keep hearing that Oregon is overdue…esp from my dad in Portland. I also hope it stays overdue!
--Deb
One of the advantages of NJ–we rarely ever have earthquakes, and even when we do, they tend to be fairly minor. (Though, the one that damaged the Washington Monument in DC enough to close it for several years actually had an epicenter just a few miles from here … but then, the Washington Monument wasn’t exactly built to earthquake-standards.) Glad to hear you’re okay, though!
J
Deb, what about all of the fracking? Is there fracking in NJ? I keep hearing how it causes earthquakes. Blech. Another reason not to do this.
Ted
This morning’s quake wasn’t too scary — except when it was really getting intense. You’re right about getting an earthquake plan and kit together in case the next epicenter is in our neck of the woods.
J
I’ll admit, it wasn’t much scary….just scary towards the end there. I think our plan thus far is to run outside screaming in our underwear. If the quake hits at 2pm, we’ll have to throw off our clothes before we run outside.
Nance
I thought about you and Mikey as soon as I heard about the quake. As I did a little research and then saw your post, I didn’t want to add to the din by calling/emailing once I knew you were both undoubtedly okay.
Rick is cringing every time he sees yet another story on the lost wine in the Napa region. All the barrel storage facilities are suffering losses, and individual wineries are mopping up. Sigh.
I saw your comment re: fracking quakes. There are some, in Ohio, but they don’t approach the magnitude of Cali earthquakes. The damage to groundwater is the problem, however; the methane gas and other impurities are the overarching concerns. They have been able to trace some earthquakes to fracking, leading to moratoriums on the practice in some regions.
Glad you’re all fine, but yes, do invest some time in preparedness, especially since one reporter said that it might be the precursor to a larger event. (We hope NOT.)
J
Nance, regarding the wine…I KNOW! It hurts. Not so much as seeing pictures of the 13 year old who was having a sleep over in the living room, and the chimney came down on him hurts. (He’s expected to recover, though it will take months, as his pelvis was crushed.) Not so much as seeing the houses burned or destroyed hurts. But as a wine lover, it does hurt. I hope that the barrel storage facilities put into practice a safer way of storing all of those barrels than simply stacking them like that. Had the earthquake happened during the daylight hours, employees might have been crushed by falling barrels. Perhaps better practices will be put into place. OSHA will perhaps get involved, now that there’s a threat that we hadn’t seen before. We’ll see.
In the meantime, “WHO WILL SAVE THE WINE???” My mother in law and I were joking that we’d help with cleanup, and just drive up there with some straws. 🙂
OmbudsBen
At the beginning of A Tale of Two Cities (I think) there is a scene where a cart hauling wine breaks, something like a broken axle, and the barrel bursts. The wretched inhabitants see all the wine gushing out and are scooping it up out of the filthy street, overjoyed at their luck.
I know what you mean about the wine. You hope the floors were nice and clean, and wish you could have been there, especially if you had a collection of old jars just waiting for a good use.
OmbudsBen
My insomnia had kicked in, so I was drifting in and out. When it first hit, the shaking was very regular; I felt a bit of a pause, then a jolt, and the rest was more irregular. That woke the missus up. The dogs sleep at the foot of our bed; I assume they woke up, but I heard/saw nothing from them, and everyone was soon back to sleep. Even me, as I drowsed in and out.
A friend of mine far away has considered moving to CA. The news of this earthquake freaked her out. She wants no part of it. I point out how many people die in tornadoes, blizzards, hurricanes, etc., elsewhere but it doesn’t matter.
She may like Carole King, but that’s as far as feeling the earth move goes for her.
J
I guess we all have our fears. Having lived through a big earthquake (’89 in SF), and seeing how little relative damage was done, I feel more comfortable with that than with hurricanes and tornadoes. I don’t mean to minimize the damage from the ’89 quake, or this one. Esp in ’89, people suffered and died. But the few houses with real damage compared to what I see on TV about tornadoes keeps me here. Probably the answer is that’s it’s better the devil you know than the devil you don’t. People who live in a tornado area could likely say the same thing….see, only 10 houses were destroyed, while the rest of the town is just fine.