COMMENTS:
I would like to know what to do when the big one comes pretty soon.
Just barely.
No , but beleive it or not they say thier is a fault line running thru part of Tennessee.
there is a fault line , man I must have had a liquid lunch today
We had one in Alabama about 3 years ago. I don't live very far from the train tracks and I thought that a train had derailed (it felt and sounded exactly like what I think a train derailment would be like and seemed to be coming from the direction of the tracks). It knocked around some dishes and some of my books and records. Also three days later the plate glass on my back door shattered for no apparent reason (I'm pretty sure the quake had something to do with it though). I heard that some other people got more damage (including damage to the foundations of some buildings). It happened very early in the morning, but I was up. Didn't panic me, but it really didn't last long enough for that (and like I said I thought it was a train). Weird, never imagined that we'd ever have a quake in Alabama (hurricanes yeah, but not earthquakes).
I lived in Sunnyvale California during the Loma Prieta earthquake. It was scary.
The last quake I experienced was on a new fault that was exposed here in Napa and it knocked me out of bed. The soil here is called alluvial (that is what the experts said) and it liquifies during a quake making it much worse because the ground both moves up and down as well as side to side.
Big earthquakes are frightening but happen far less frequently than tornados or hurricanes which seem to kill dozens of people every year in the US.
The "big one" will probably come in a place that is already earthquake prone. So if you live in those areas, you should prepare. If you still live in Penn or somewhere where earthquakes don't already routinely happen then don't worry about it. You would be much more likely to get cancer from a sunburn then any injury from a quake there.
If you live in an area prone you should be prepared ahead of time.
First you should cover yourself if you can't exit the building you are in. Doorways are good. Under a sturdy table.
Second following a big quake you should be prepared to turn the gas off. Have a wrench ready and know how to turn it off.
You should prepare prior to anything happening. Secure bookcases and large furniture to the wall. Don't hang anything over or near your bed. Don't hang anything heavy, or have big furniture in your bedroom.
You should have three days supply of non-perishable food products and potable water ready
Of course you should have a first aid kit.
Anything that you have prepared should be in a place that is easily accesible and in all likelihood won't be destroyed in an earthquake.
Most buildings in areas that are prone to quakes are so well built, or have had seismic retro-fitting that the chance of injury is very small. The Loma Prieta and the Northridge earthquakes both killed and did great damage because nothing is foolproof. But, for example, compare how many are killed in large earthquakes in Japan (none for 7.1) and how many were killed in Iran (thousands for a 6.5), and you will see the validity of that statement.
24 years ago we had a couple of mild ones then a few years ago, here in Manchester we had a series of about 40 very mild quakes but nothing heavy, just rattled the doors a little.
^^
That should read "14 years ago"
im not sure, London got hit by a minor quake a few years ago and i vaguely remember waking up in the middle of the night to fel the ground shaking but I could have imiagined it
Back in April of 2003, there was a 3.6 tremblor, epicenter about forty miles northwest of Birmingham, Alabama. The after shock was felt in Savannah. I'm about halfway between the two, and it felt as though there was a heavy construction truck going up my street (which I took it to be, as there was a school being built about a quarter-mile away from my house). I started to go back to sleep when I realized that it was all of five in the morning, got up and look out my windows, saw nothing. I turned on the early news at five-thirty, and there was the story, along with people calling in from all over the Metro area. When the sun came up, I was able to see cracks along the juncture between my ceiling and one wall in my bedroom. I found a second in my living room.
No one was hurt, minimal damage all the way around. Unless you count the damage to my wallet done by the repairs.
Yeah, when I lived in CA.
everygirl, you mean the New Madrid fault, it formed Reelfoot Lake and made the Mississippi River flow backwards , I used to live there. It supposedly rang church bells all the way in Boston.
Truthseeker 013, I think that's the same quake I mentioned. I was off a year, but otherwise the particulars are the same.
Once. Sitting in a restaurant near Panorama in California. The walls moved, it sounded as a heavy truck coming down the road. I felt paralyzed and the servers continued serving.
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