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5.8 Earthquake Hits East Coast of the US
At 1:51 p.m. EDT a 5.8 magnitude earthquake hit Virginia (map of reported tremors). Reports indicate it was felt along most of the east coast (my monitor and floor definitely wobbled a bit down here in Raleigh NC) with reported evacuations of government buildings at least in DC. QuantumPion noted that the North Anna Nuclear Generating Station is located only a few miles from the epicenter, and the NRC has confirmed the plant automatically shut down with no apparent damage. For folks who like that sort of thing, there is a hashtag on Twitter, and the WSJ has a page with live updates on the situation.
Felt it here, third floor of a building. Nothing more here than a gentle sway back and forth 3-4 times.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
How did this make Slashdot already? Nothing makes this site for weeks.
I felt it in Southern New Jersey. Everyone was dumb founded for a little while - "Whose shaking the cubicle wall?" Then everyone ended up outside with no cell service. After a few minutes we all hit the web and that was also saturated. Natural disaster practice test.
Marques Johansson
I work 3rd shift & was woken up with stuff falling from the shelves. First earthquake I actually felt.
I was sitting at my desk and everything swayed a little bit...
desk started moving under my feet. not the first time so no big deal
all the chicks that work in the building here that is full of fashion and modeling companies got scared and evacuated right away
I was wondering why my drink was moving left too right. Can anyone here who knows geology explain their reason for thinking that there may be another quake or not another quake? I am talking about a timeframe of today. NYC, shaking here felt like when you are about to faint and dizzy, a slight nudging left to right.
Pretty serious: http://jmckinley.posterous.com/dc-earthquake-devastation
I think my principles are reachin' an all time low
Felt it here in Vermont, got our building swaying.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
Earthquakes in the eastern US are felt over a much wider area than those in the western US. It's one big plate, so an earthquake anywhere is felt all across it. Like hitting a pipe with a hammer.
In the west the plates are broken up by many faults, which absorb the energy release.
Best Slashdot Co
The event webpage: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Quakes/usc0005ild.php
Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
The whole house shook for a good minute or more. Now I don't have to wonder what an earthquake feels like.
Where I am now, the cell and land lines phones are out, but I still have cable Internet access - thank you Comcast (oh the irony)
BTW Mineral is not Northern VA
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
It's a pretty big deal for a place as tectonically stable (normally) as the mid-Atlantic region. Shook us pretty well here in Annapolis. Also caused evacs from the Capitol; even God wants them to stop spending so much money.
Congrats to the East Coast for feeling an earthquake. With love from the West Coast.
Got reports from a friend that works at Penn State that his building was shaking before the news reports started popping up.
How's Facebook's stock handling this? The quake was just north north east of FarmVille. Productivity everywhere just increased.
Yep, we felt it too (Mississauga, just west of Toronto). I thought it was a stress related dizzy spell for a second!
What to Do During an Earthquake
What to Do After an Earthquake
Get cover, stay there, and don't go outside.
Was someone doing some fracking that we don't know about?
g=
On the top floor of a three story building, felt a pretty good wobble.
Also felt it here in Raleigh @RDU - 2nd floor - Roughly 5-6 seconds a couple of small bursts?
i called our director of IT who was a mile away in another building and he said i was crazy. so i hit up twitter and everyone is saying how NYC just had an earthquake. didn't even bother to check the news since twitter is as close to real time as you can get
My office building is a single story cubicle farm. We felt two waves here of steady shaking. 37 miles away my fiance felt our apartment building swaying as well. No damage here that I'm aware of but some people are going home anyway.
Felt it here... People were evacuating building, businesses are closing down, and gov workers are going home..... All over the little shake we felt. Oh and as I was writing this just heard they were evacuating our capitol.
They just upgraded it to 5.9. Felt it here on the 39th floor of my company's building. At first I thougth I was having a panic attack or something, then I realized everyone else was trying to figure out what was going on (the building is tall enough to catch wind sometimes, so it isn't abnormal to feel a brief shake). We ran to the window (engineers know better than to hide in doorways!) and verified that the water in the pool on top of the building next door was shimmying, indicating some definite motion was going on. Now I just feel a little queasy. Weird experience.
Interesting that Colorado got a M5.3 (which is rare). OMG. The End Is Near!
USGS link
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Felt in Toronto too.
I live in northern NJ and didn't even know there was a quake until I saw it on the web. As a geology teacher I'm really disappointed because I've never actually experienced an earthquake directly. Maybe I'll get lucky and there'll be some strong aftershocks. That would rock!
I've finally lived the dream of getting to watch my furniture dance without the benefit of alcohol. I'm about an hour's drive from the epicenter.
I walked into the office after coming back from lunch and everyone was all excited about some earthquake or some such nonsense. I was driving and didn't feel a thing. The roads here are terrible though, but sure explains why everyone was loitering around outside buildings down the main drag in town.
Felt it here at work. We're on the third floor of an old brick factory building. Certainly heard a few items upstairs hit the floor. Everyone went outside and proceeded to not have cell service. Text was fine though.
The Digital Sorceress
Note that my workstation is locked into NTP (drift of 5.0ms) but in any case I'd expect that Google's servers are too.
Been there, done that, paid for the T-shirt
and didn't get it
5.9's a pretty big earthquake for the East Coast, no? I'm surprised there wasn't more damage. Anyone know what magnitude the buildings are built to withstand? (As far as cell/internet/land lines being down, that happens on the West Coast too, but it's just because everyone's trying to use them at the same time.)
Felt it in Barrie too.
The USGS site has it occurring a few minutes earlier - 1:51pm - while here we say 1:58pm. Not sure where the slashdot article gets its time from, or what the discrepancy comes from...
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
18th floor of an office building, a bunch of the people noticed it, and a whole lot didn't. Guess it depends on what you're doing. I blame my not noticing on being a guy and therefore a poor multitasker :D
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
5.8 isnt tiny, and this one was felt over a rather large area.
The epicenter of the earthquake was apparently just a few miles away from North Anna Nuclear Power Plant.
We just received notice that the Pentagon is being evacuated, as a precaution.
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
Felt the desk moving, thought it was a truck outside again. When it didn't stop after a second we were all looking around puzzled. Hoping everything at home is okay.
Not many clouds in the sky - no tornado... only thing left that's not unnatural is earthquake. It was neat, but slightly scary too.
We didn't feel nothing down here...
Or not
I just flew in to Detroit on business, so I didn't feel it, but you can see it pretty clearly impacted the area near downtown. It shook a few houses to the ground, it left immense cracks in the streets, and I can already see looting going on.
God, some areas look like a third-world country now! I hope the other places handled it better.
Information theory is life. The rest is just the KL divergence.
Not that many. So yes, it is news.
It was well recorded on the University Laval (Quebec) seismograph:
http://www2.ggl.ulaval.ca/seismographe_r.html
Really, I'm near DC and it wasn't that big a deal. People running into the streets were in greater danger of being hit by cars than by having their building fall down. I saw a group of people standing BETWEEN two buildings, both of which had large panes of glass that, if they fell, could ruin someone's day.
...from everyone calling their friends and trying to update facebook...
0 damage would be highly improbable
83% likelihood of $1 million to $1 billion in damage
22% likelihood it killed someone
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/pager/events/us/c0005ild/index.html
I felt it in Baltimore. I could hear the glassware in the lab shaking. At first I thought it was from a nearby construction site.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it dissolve.
We have an office 2 miles for Indian Point in Peekskill, NY. Our building rattled slightly for about 2 minutes....
Heard kids running around upstairs, then started hearing/feeling shaking. Chandelier started swinging slightly. Probably 30-45 seconds. My first earthquake, but kept calm, surprisingly.
If you can read this, it means that I bothered to log in.
Felt it here in Toronto on the 32nd floor - building started swaying a fair bit. Thought I had too much blood in my alcohol system for a second there...
I thought I felt something earlier in SC but the washing machine was also spin cycling so I just shrugged it off. Wonder if the quake might have been a butterfly effect from that.
God wants them to tax the rich (never God's favorite folks) and spend more money on poor people so they stop blaming God for how fucked up their lives are under the plutocracy.
Also, why on Earth would they evacuate the Pentagon AFTER the earthquake? Does that make any sense at all?
Well, this is the east coast. No one knew what the hell was going on until it was over.
Felt it in Ottawa too.
Panic now, beat the rush!
There is a fault line, you are wrong.
That is just a coincidence.
The pentagon is full of old fogies most of who don't know their ass from a hole in the ground, so this is what they do when they get a tiny little shake.
Felt it here too. Fentle, heard air conditioning ducts crackling once/twice.
I'm in a holding pattern above the airport in Philadelphia because all of the major airports up and down this coast have been "briefly" shut down for runway inspections. I hope the delay is briefer than the duration of my fuel reserve.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
Felt it on the third floor of my building in Rockville, MD. Shook the floor upwards a bit, figured I'm better at work than at home -- that's the 16th floor.
That was something.
~EEE~
I think this is the fastest an event has ever made it to Slashdot.
Felt in here in Maine. My house was moving with the beat on the radio and I was like WTF??? Then I realized.
Felt it too...
Felt it for a good 7-10 seconds in the Chesapeake Bay area.
Our office is a small building on a concrete slab. We NEVER feel much in the way of movement. When this thing hit, I ran outside. The water storage reservoirs were making ominous oil-canning sounds on an industrial scale. Significant rumbling with some side to side movement.
Reminder for those of you in the East Coast: Something made those Appalachian mountains. It may not be as active as the West coast, but it would be wise not to ignore it.
Nearly fifty percent of all graduates come from the bottom half of the class!
Felt it here too... seems a bit far away, but perhaps it's because I'm in a hi-rise. Building swayed for several seconds, long enough for everyone here to wander out of their cubes asking if anyone else felt it.
The other thing is there are no mountians to dampen the quake so people feel it from St Louis to Miami to Maine. So more people get wind it happened sooner.
And apparently everyone who felt it feels the need to come to /. and say, "Hey, I felt it!"
There was one last night in CO. Why is this news for nerds?
Earth quakes on the east coast are pretty rare. Also, no one with internet access lives in Colorado.
Required reading for internet skeptics
USGS earthquake was a 5.8 about 3.7 miles down.
S & P downgraded it to 4.5.
God did it.
Definitely felt the whole building moving. Very new feeling for me.
I'm sure it's no biggie for West Coast folks, but that's the first time I felt the actual ground under me move.
Transistors and Beer!!
Now it's 5.9 - still probably nothing to you guys, but pretty exciting for us. Just imagine if you guys got 2 inches of snow, though!
How did this make Slashdot already? Nothing makes this site for weeks.
http://xkcd.com/723/ :P
That's how
I am an ACCA student. Got a query on Accountancy/Finance? Maybe I can help!
East Coasters are just not as hardy as folks out west. Where we still kill bears with our own hands and posse up to get dangerous outlaws packing 6 guns.
My desk started shaking around. I was more confused than anything else. My immediate impression was of some big truck passing outside, but I'm in a building far too large to be affected by that, so I finally came to the conclusion that it must've been an earthquake. Twitter confirmed the suspicion...
Apparently it was felt all the way up the east coast. Pretty intense, by far the largest earthquake ever recorded in the area according to the USGS. The talking head on the news suggested that because this area is so geologically inactive, the crust is very cold and "bell-like" so even minor quakes tend to travel, in a way that a more plastic crust would not facilitate.
No damage here, nor injuries, but everyone felt it. My university issued a public safety alert.
Very strange.
I have developed a truly marvelous proof of this comment, which this signature is too narrow to contain.
Yep, I felt it too. I'm in a 5 story building on the top floor.
*yawn* what? The east coast had an earthquake? They do get them. The history or science channel had a show about it. I think the most frightening thing is that they believe there is a huge san andreas type fault like in the Ohio valley or the Mississippi river or something.....I'll have to find the info.
I find it funny watching all the east coast people all worried. Eh, we California people are like chill about it. Call us when you have a 6 or more quake
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
--
To be fair, when Virginia gets 2 inches of snow they have to shut down the entire state.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
Oh no, 22% chance somebody died? We need Congress to BAN EARTHQUAKES! THINK OF THE CHILDREN!
I felt a couple wobbles. Everyone was going out into the street to see what was going on. I don't know if they fuckin' expected the Red Army to be going down the street or a goddamned Gundam to be going rooftop-to-rooftop... it was nothin' here in Jersey.
Random Thoughts From A Diseased Mind (Not For Dummies)
Don't worry, you'll feel a big one soon. We get those 5.8 - type quakes roughly once every two years or so on average. or at least it feels lke it. I feel a quake here in SF a few times a year, but always small.
Our building shook a bit at first. Enough for me to look out the window for a big truck. Then it shook harder. That one was enough to knock some books off the shelf and get everyone to evacuate.
Everyone picked up their cell phones at the same time and overloaded all the networks. Only Sprint worked. They must have so few customers left it doesn't matter. AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon were all useless. That includes forcing the phones to use 2G only.
I think I need to re-new my Ham license, just in case.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
And according to USGS it was also 0.6 miles deep, with a vertical uncertainty of plus or minus 4.6 miles. Gotta watch out for those mid-air earthquakes! They're sneaky!
From USGS
Magnitude 5.9
Date-Time
Tuesday, August 23, 2011 at 17:51:03 UTC
Tuesday, August 23, 2011 at 01:51:03 PM at epicenter
Location 37.975ÂN, 77.969ÂW
Depth 1 km (~0.6 mile) (poorly constrained)
Region VIRGINIA
Distances
6 km (4 miles) SSE (152Â) from Louisa, VA
6 km (4 miles) SW (236Â) from Mineral, VA
26 km (16 miles) SE (133Â) from Gordonsville, VA
32 km (20 miles) E (79Â) from Lake Monticello, VA
66 km (41 miles) NW (318Â) from Richmond, VA
134 km (83 miles) SW (219Â) from Washington, DC
Location Uncertainty horizontal +/- 10.9 km (6.8 miles); depth +/- 7.4 km (4.6 miles)
Parameters NST=390, Nph=390, Dmin=57.9 km, Rmss=1.17 sec, Gp= 47Â,
M-type=regional moment magnitude (Mw), Version=6
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
Depending on how poorly parts of the Pentagon were designed, parts of it could collapse, rendering it unsafe for human occupancy. As we said, Sir, it's just a precaution. Nothing to worry about.
People in so-cal tie their computer racks to the wall with Earthquake Straps.
People on the east coast are about to find out why they're called that.
No, and because of the geology of the ground (it is much harder on the East Coast) the quake travels MUCH further...
Anyone have a map of past quakes in this region? Its difficult to judge how unusual this even is. Anecdotally, it seems that such events are more rare on the east coast than out west. Californians probably wouldn't get out of bed for a 5.8.
And what sort of seismograph coverage does the east coast have? Its pretty good on the west coast, what with all the faults, volcanoes and whatnot.
Have gnu, will travel.
This should put some pressure on New Madrid. Nothing says earthquake safety like thousands of 100 year old brick buildings scattered across the midwest.
The real Sig captains the Northwestern. This one captains
Oh yeah? I'm in California, and I didn't feel it!
If you can't convince them, convict them.
Yea, just wait a couple days. You will have plenty to report. -Love Midwest.
*Yawn* Here in So Cal we don't even get out of bed for a 5.8.
OK, that's done.
My building in DC was evacuated after this. It was actually powerful enough to knock a TV off the all and a few plant pots onto the ground. To be honest, when it struck I couldn't help but think terrorist attack before earthquake crossed my mind.
If that were true...why would he strike when Congress is in recess and the President's on vacation?
:(){
And apparently everyone who felt it feels the need to come to /. and say, "Hey, I felt it!"
This is /. ... its about the only time they get post about someone saying "They felt it!" ...
"Curiouser and Curiouser...." -Alice
Earth Quake -> Geology -> Science -> Nerds
"Without curiosity and knowledge, the mind is a vast void. Without the mind, curiosity and knowledge are nonexistent."
Kris from New jesrey I was laying on bed watching TV at 1.45 PM today.At 1.50 I fely and heard a strange sound appearing on my bed below.Later it intensified and felt for more than a two second.It was virtually shaking and I was scared.It cooled down.I tried to reach 911 but the line was already engaged.I could finally reach and the Police enquired if everything was okay.I said it was okay.This was the first time in my life to have experienced the earth quake in this part of the world!
Why would you call 911? Especially since everything was OK? It's more rhetorical since this is an AC but this is sometimes why the lines get tied up in an emergency, clueless people jamming the emergency lines for no reason.
I don't know if my coworkers are a bunch of liars or not, but they claim to have felt an Earthquake around 1:50pm.
Personally, I didn't feel a thing.
However, our company sent an email to all employees in our building stating that there were reports of slight building movements throughout the entire complex, likely due to this Earthquake.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
slashdot was the one website I was able to access on 9/11/2001 while everyone else's tubes were clogged. Say what you will about the articles or the commentary or the curious sometime lack of editing prowess, but at least the dudes who run this joint have their shit together enough to keep it online when most others freeze up.
Eloi are stupid, throw morlocks at them!
You can say that again. Oh, you meant no -earthquakes-. Yeah, there probably weren't any of those either.
Nah, I'll just do what every other floridian does when there is a hurricane.
If what I just said sounded like a troll, it was probably just a failed attempt at humor.
Lets hope this wasn't some evil mastermind calling the US politician's bluff about some world extortion plan.
Also, why on Earth would they evacuate the Pentagon AFTER the earthquake? Does that make any sense at all?
I'd sort of hope that the Pentagon would be built to better standards than that; but I can think of one reason you might evacuate after a quake: If the shaking cracked/sheared any gas lines, you could theoretically end up with a delightsome fuel-air situation in part of the building. In that case, you'd want the herd out of the building before the situation deteriorates.
With stronger quakes, or shoddier buildings, it isn't unheard of for buildings that don't collapse immediately to do so during the aftershocks, in which case you would prefer to be outside as well.(Again, though, serious risk of collapse in the face of a 5.8 should be a breach of any decent building code, much less the standards that you'd want your giant military headquarters/symbolic structure built to...)
And the resulting tsunami was 1000x smaller too.
A 5.9 earthquake is nothing to scoff at, but the media is already seriously blowing this out of proportion.
I've been in two comparably strong earthquake in Asia. Everyone looks at each other for a second, the shaking gets more violent and we all bolt for the doors going outside. The ground stops moving, but stuff like lightpoles keep swaying for a bit longer. Fairly quickly everyone is assured that it's not a big one and everyone goes back to their normal routine. Anyone who was stuck inside doesn't even bother going outside.
It's comical the way people in DC are streaming into the streets. Don't panic!
Shouldn't you be flying the plane rather than posting on Slashdot? Or does Kareem have that covered? :)
Just imagine if you guys got 2 inches of snow, though!
Meh. That's all the California/East Coast wussies I hear crying. Out here, we have mountains. Real mountains, with real snowfall.
I skied in that.
Have gnu, will travel.
Oh please... I live in Indonesia. A 5.9 earthquake barely even makes the news. A 5.9 is like, "Uhhh, hrmm, something feels strange, am I feeling a bit dizzy? Oh no, it's just a small earthquake."
Seriously though, the depth of the earthquake makes a big difference and this one seemed to be shallow, so I can imagine most people clearly felt it. However, the shake map looks pretty tame. http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/shakemap/global/shake/c0005ild/
Indeed. When I was in Japan, I was surprised that everyone carried umbrellas with them all day if there was a cloud in the sky, they had little umbrella wrapping machines outside of buildings to make sure as little moisture as possible got inside. People were very concerned they might get wet.
A mild earthquake on the other hand, people continued getting onto elevators, didn't stop to look around to make sure nothing was falling over onto them.
If it was felt from "VA to MA" wouldn't that put the epicenter around NYC? I would expect you to find reports from somewhere more like GA or such to MA....or was this a unidirectional quake that only sent waves north?
oh and yes.... was definitely felt in Boston. Actually, I think this is the first quake that I ever noticed and was able to attribute to being as such. If I have ever felt any others, it was indistinguishable from the washing machine being loaded slightly badly.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Far too many builders do so-so to piss poor construction. Now that ppl are realizing that they can be hit with a much larger quake, they will want to change their tunes. KB homes, Richmond, etc. All crap.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Why would you call 911? Especially since everything was OK? It's more rhetorical since this is an AC but this is sometimes why the lines get tied up in an emergency, clueless people jamming the emergency lines for no reason.
And not just to call 911. It is not uncommon in the afternoon before expected hurricane landfall for cell phones to not be able to place calls, as so many people are tying up the lines calling everybody they can think of, just to chat about eachother's hurricane preps. Everybody so quick to jump online and check the news sites, change their status, etc. from their mobile device, I'm surprised any calls to 911 even get through.
Earth Quake -> Geology -> Science -> Nerds
My point was, CO didn't make the news list, but the DC one did.
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
Nope. I lived on the east coast for 25 years and this was the first time I've ever felt an earthquake.
Not even during sex?
Ah, I forgot where I was posting for a second. Mea Culpa.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Felt it bad here, I work in a 50-year-old building. No way this place stays intact if a sustained quake hits.
Yea, just wait a couple days. You will have plenty to report. -Love Midwest.
so i herd u lik tornados :p
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
It was a shot across the bow ;)
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
Felt it in Asheville, NC. About 20 seconds of slight shaking. No big deal, but still weird if you've never felt a quake before.
In theory I am an agnostic, but pending the appearance of radical evidence I must be classed as an Atheist.
Questions:
1. What year were seismic ratings incorporated into national and local building codes?
2. What year (er, range of years) was the Pentagon built?
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Because this is the highest earthquake in the state on record, and it spawns a great geological discussion on how earthquakes travel farther in the east due to the solid nature of the ground in comparison to the west coast.
Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
My east coast friends always made fun of us California for shutting down our roads and schools for an inch of snow. Guess the shoe is on the other foot now? :p
Lanham, MD. The floor swayed, didn't hear anything. A few ceiling tiles fell.
Did you mount a military-grade, variable-focus MASER on an unlicensed artificial intelligence?
Yeah, since the Sierra Nevada mountain range isn't real or anything...
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
None in Europe either...
not true.. 5.8 = 5.8
even though geology is different - for the area's the 5.8 is the measured amplitude of the strongest seismic wave.
USGS is pointing this one as a 5.9 at a depth of 1km.. luckily it i was in the middle of nowhere - had it been centered on a city on the eastern seaboard it this could have been a very bad earthquake.
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsus/Maps/US2/37.39.-79.-77_eqs.php
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
Earth quakes on the east coast are pretty rare. Also, no one with internet access lives in Colorado.
Are you implying there are people without internet access there? It was my understanding that, aside from towns on the western banks of the Mississippi River and cities on the Pacific coast, no one lives in the western half of the US aside from cacti, tumbleweed, some wild horses, and a couple of mountain lions.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
If there's a fault line, it isn't documented.
If you mean seismic zones, yes... but no fault lines.
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Estimated loss of productivity: negative $235,000,000
Nerds like to learn?
and knowing about things happening help you correlate things, and correlations help with learning about anomolies...
it's science.
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I work a bit south of Baltimore. We felt it here for about 30 seconds. Of course my office is next to shipping and I thought maybe they'd finally lost it and knocked all the shelves over in an attempt to crush me finally. But nope.. earth quake. They've evacuated a number of office buildings in downtown Baltimore from what my wife is saying (she was sent home). Her brother said he felt it as far as Ft. Wayne IN as well.
I don't care what you say, all I need is my Wumpabet soup.
About 70 miles from the epicenter here in Warrenton, VA. Few pictures moved on the walls, few things thrown off some shelves but, nothing serious. My local community college took a bit of damage, and is currently closed "until further notice". Maybe the world is coming to an end...
Which explains why CO wasn't covered how?
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
And when someone calls 911, they HAVE to dispatch someone out to the location even if the caller said everything is ok. I have a sister that worked as a 911 dispatcher for several years and they had to do this many times.
This vs. this.
I'm in New Jersey. I felt it. If you're from California, you probably wouldn't have noticed it.
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
Which, of course, would have been more helpful if they hadn't somehow reset the VA earthquake's stats. But give it some time and I suppose it will fill back in. And I really meant to paste the links to the distance vs. intensity plots, not just the city maps, but I hit Submit instead of Continue Editing.
Here in central pa (huntingdon and Alexandria) its as if you only noticed it indoors. My father-in-law said the shelves at his work vibrated, and the sister-in-law came out and asked if I felt anything (digging a support pole for a deck extension at their place)... I said no and both her and her mom said they did inside and the neighbor did too... weird as I was on the ground digging with a crazy small shovel due to it being a tight spot.. felt nothing)
Sorry, we didn't feel the CO one. You need to make yours more powerful. 7.0 would be good.
If I used a sig over again, would anyone notice?
I understand the natural instinct for Californians to be dismissive, but this was the largest quake in the recorded history of Virginia, and the strongest on the east coast in over 100 years. The media is over-hyping it for sure, but it is historically and scientifically significant. Also, keep in mind that buildings on the east coast are not designed to withstand seismic events to the same extent as those in California, and are on the whole MUCH older than west coast buildings.
Good Virginia Earthquake Information
Mod points if I had them...very well put.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
Albany, NY. Felt it lightly; saw some water moving in a bottle, nothing else. Odd thing is, there was a 2.2 in Albany County at 6:35 this morning, and I didn't feel it at all. Either way, this is obviously an indication of the end of the world and we should all panic.
Good Information on history and science of earthquakes in Virginia
I found interesting that the chances of a quake in excess of 4.75 magnitude in Virginia over 100 years are 10-20%. This quake was over ten times as powerful at a 5.9.
A few days ago it was Colorado, now Virginia. Even the earthquakes are leaving California for more fertile ground. Pretty soon there will be nothing but terremotos and tsunamis out here.
Hurricane Irene says 'hi'.
My desk is connected to the wall, and started shaking. Being as I'm technically in the basement though, there wasn't any actual swaying (no red stapler jokes now!)
At first I thought maybe two coworkers were going at it like Rhodesian mud bunnies in the adjacent office or something. Umm.. not that that happens here a lot.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
Didn't feel a thing and don't give a shit.
Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
So does DC/VA/MD...
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
You skied in snow? I always skied on top of snow.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Amazingly, none of our computer racks fell over. But, you have a good point.
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
If this didn't happen in such a rural county, there could have been major damage. Virginia doesn't get earthquakes very often, and our buildings aren't made to with stand them. There were some reports of buildings that caved in in Mineral - imagine what would have happened if the epicenter was in a more urban area like Arlington or Richmond.
Not only that, but our emergency crews aren't prepared to respond. Most of our people have never even felt earthquakes.
Ever heard of the Appalachian mountains? They were created by the upthrusting of two plates colliding...
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
As opposed to evacuating before the earthquake?
The evacuate to check the building. If you are in a building that didn't evacuate, you are wither in a new building with good earthquake minimization technology, or your building is being run by ass hats.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I noticed this first on the USGS website, and was alarmed to see that the quake was near Farmville
Mountain Run Fault, Brookneal Fault, Shores Fault, Lakeside Fault, Spotsylvania Fault, Hylas Fault
Of course they are part of the Eastern Piedmont fault.
but please, go on...
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I was on the second floor when things started rattling and we all went outside. It took about 2 minutes for the event to stop.
Because it wasn't felt by many people. God, I had forgotten how whiny people in Colorado are for attention.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I felt nothing, but I might have been asleep...
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
The Obama administration has announced that the newly discovered fault line runs just south of DC all the way into Texas and will be name "Bush's Fault"
Are you implying there are people without internet access there? It was my understanding that, aside from towns on the western banks of the Mississippi River and cities on the Pacific coast, no one lives in the western half of the US aside from cacti, tumbleweed, some wild horses, and a couple of mountain lions.
While this is likely true, I was trying to account for any errant travelers, hopelessly lost in the Rockies, who have not yet been eaten by a mountain lion.
Also, bigfoot.
Required reading for internet skeptics
I felt it while on the beach in cape may new jersey, everyone was like "wtf" I thought it was kinda cool.
If I had to guess, it would be because he/she was "virtually shaking and [...] scared"? That doesn't warrant calling 911 but that's the reason he/she did it. Not hard to understand.
Your point? Something has to be experienced by a lot of people to really be considered news for nerds?
I find your logic full of holes and bad assumptions.
=================
Unix is very user friendly, it's just picky about who its friends are.
You Mama's so fat, when she walks across the living room she makes the radio skip!!
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
They basicially use over-determined triangulation to calculate epicenter coordinates. When the epicenter is close to the plane of seismometers, the vertical resolution is terrible. So they fix an arbitrary default depth to the quake to calculate lateral position.
GPS altitude resolution is poor for the same reason.
Only in DC, Eastern Shore and Norfolk. There's a big chunk of Virginia that sees snow quite often.
God does want us to give to the poor, but only as individuals, not as citizens being taxed to death. You can't get to Heaven spending the money of others.
Slightly OT: The US can't reach and mess with European slashdotters, so they have much less qualms before stating what neighborhood they live in for all the world to see (forever). Japan's first quake/reactor story had a handful of responders indicating location earlier this year as well as slashdot-JAPAN comments partially translated in very informative efforts of a couple brave souls who said exactly where they got hit.
Despite ALL that, I've NEVER seen so many stating their location --remember that a few months down the road you're the same guys who might just jokingly post the DeCSS key or "You sank my battleship" re-twit. I guess this is how social engineering wins --feelings of helpfulness and disaster collaboration lower our defenses. For those who don't get it, American slashdotters are very secretive about giving up their location on a permanent storage medium because there are so many stalkers and LAWYERS with fingers in the right triggers.
It doesn't matter that a street address wasn't given; to someone dedicated to enough of a payoff, we all fall little by little; just like how everyone here agrees that "physical access makes that 1,000,000bit encryption key useless." Someone with an axe to grind can now google those /. nicks and add "earthquake" to find your town. Based on town, and your posting time, it narrows down which ISPs they need to subpoena for an IP address, without even knocking on Slashdot's doors.
More like 6 inches. 2 inches falling at evening commute will get an early closure though to stagger people going home (many people just stay anyways after a closure of that type).
Pffffttttt.. 5.8? that's not even worth crawling out of bed for. /so-cal
Yeah, yeah. It's news out there too, and don't deny it. The difference is that when the East Coast gets an earthquake, the whole East Coast feels it due to us all sitting on the same huge plate. Despite your Los Angeles conceit, the center of the American civilization is in the corridor from Virginia to New York to Massachusetts, which comprises a large plurality of our population. These are old cities comparatively, with many buildings built well before earthquakes were understood, let alone prepared for. A 5.anything quake is an alarming occurrence.
I won't minimize the importance of earthquake preparation, especially on our west coast. But, just think, our national Capitol was built before seismology was a science. They had to evacuate because they didn't know how the building would react. I've read accounts that there were some cracks in the plaster. What happens if this was a 6.x event? The old buildings we look to as our connection to history would be in serious jeopardy. There is evidence of 7.x earthquakes east of the Mississippi (see also: New Madrid). Imagine our Capitol tumbling to the ground and the Washington Monument laying on its side in the Mall. Even Fallout 3 wasn't so dystopian.
PS Bro, next time LA gets a decent quake don't post.
Trying to take out the root of the problem. Lobbyists.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
Saw that already; both funny and informative seem appropriate.
I'm working in one of DC's Virginia suburbs this summer, and I definitely noticed my office walls shake for a few seconds in a couple bursts around 2 PM.
However, I admit I _am_ kinda in "no big deal" mode about the whole thing.
The building evacuations were more annoying. (of my office building, my highrise apartment building and assorted retail facilities where I may have run errands.)
Building security hustled us out, but I had already picked up most of my stuff. We waited around a bit before finding out that we were headed home for the day as opposed to going back in and finishing the day after the building was cleared. (I was reminded of school fire drills that ran 15 to 30 minutes or so.)
I live less than half a mile from the office, and took my bicycle like usual. Most people were trying to get out by car, and I was reminded of a crowd leaving a concert/sporting event - the vehicle traffic was bad enough that walking or bicycle riding was actually a quicker way out.
However, the apartment complex’s staff still had the elevators turned off, so I rode the bicycle around a bit to kill time/blow off steam, and eventually had dinner at a nearby fast food place that hadn’t closed down for the day.
I ended up back in the apartment by about the time I would have retuned from a normal work day.
However, I do need to deal with the fact that my phone’s texting keypads were coincidentally on the fritz.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
I'm in Arizona... didnt feel a thing.
This sig is not paradoxical or ironic.
evacuating the building in case of an aftershock?
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
somebody beat you to the punch with a similar joke about Detroit.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Many of us felt it at Notre Dame. I got up right away and asked the lady in the cube over if she felt it too, and she did. Many at another building on campus felt it as well. It was very clear to me, my office chair rocked back and forth slowly.
I'm from California, and live here still; a 5.8 would be all over the news unless it was in the middle of East Bumfuck, San Bernardino County. [...] So yes, I know that in California we generally take these things in stride (though I guarantee you would be talking about a 5.8 if it hit near you), but just quit with the bullshit.
Yup. The most recent comparable earthquake I can recall here in the San Francisco Peninsula was the 2007 Alum Rock Earthquake, a 5.6. It was very noticeable, many people stopped working and spent the next 10 minutes chatting about it and browsing the web for information about it. It was a minor nationwide news story, meriting an AP story and brief mentions in CNN and the likes, and there were a few local stories the next day about the minor damage close to the epicenter. But then after that nobody really talks about it anymore.
A 5.9 in the east coast, well, that's a modest quake, but it's also a "Man bites dog" story.
Are you adequate?
Indeed. That's the reason we keep a land line, because if there's any major incident (and here in Seattle that can be two inches of snow) the cell system is clogged. With a land line you sometimes can't make a local call but you can almost always call long distance. Disaster recovery plans for your family should include an out-of-state number (granny, aunt, sister, friend, whatever) where messages can be left for each other.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
I felt the tremors in southern Maine.
I'd sell when it reaches 6.0
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
In fairness to them, you would feel pretty stupid if you were the only guy in Jersey to miss a Gundam hopping around the rooftops!
6000 years ago, when God created building codes and civil engineers.
Rebuilt from the ground up in the latter half of September 2001 by Paul Revere himself. We will never forget.
I was trying to reference the linking-to-the-obligatory-XKCD phenomenon without quite doing it myself. :)
And xkcd.com/number is pretty straightforward.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
twice
Sounded like the dryer was VERY unbalanced.
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
About 40 miles from Mineral. Home to the world's greatest Used IBook distributor.
Wife and I were taking an afternoon nap. Building starts vibrating and rattling.
Asked the wife (california girl) Earthquake?
"Yes, do you have them here?"
She didn't want to hear about Virginia seismologic happenings or the thermally active areas in the state. She just went back to sleep.
I got up and googled for info, which was abundantly available, then turned on the TV. The local channels were into full info mode and went on for hours about the quake. Various politicians and other vultures put in their expected appearances and offered mostly uniformed opinions. The worst consequence seems to have been the early let off of all government workers in DC which jammed transportation in NVa.
He even broke parts of the National Cathedral - Turns out, He's not Episcopal .... He's Quaker.
Atlas Shrugged : Thematic Story
Appears that NOAA's latest revision has it pushed out to sea a bit more than yesterday. GP may get a reprieve.
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/refresh/graphics_at4+shtml/143914.shtml?50wind120?large#contents
Just another day in Paradise
As a VA resident who grew up and learned to drive in Michigan, I have to shed a tear every time I see a bit of snow here, and realize what a bunch of sissies live here.
Just another day in Paradise
Also, why on Earth would they evacuate the Pentagon AFTER the earthquake? Does that make any sense at all?
Kind of hard to evacuate it before the earthquake.