Took 8 Months Since I Arrived

[fj]

I thought I was really not doing well here at work, getting all dizzy and rumbly, but it turned out ot be a minor earthquake. Still feel crappy though.

Comments

[fj.livejournal.com]

Were I in Boston I'd say a heavy truck rumbled by. Were I in an old building in Amsterdam I would have thought somebody was hitting the reverberation sweet spot when walking on the old floor in the hallway. Then I heard someone say 'Did you feel that? Was that something?' and I snapped to from my slumber and realized that I am in a solid new building in LA, and hit the usgs page for SoCal to check.

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

A few years ago, I was quite embarassed to go the other direction with that. I was in a coffee shop that vibrated pretty dramatically. I was absolutely certain it had been an earthquake, (I've felt several smallish real earthquakes), but when I checked later -- nothing.

I'd say your first quake calls for a celebration. Have a cupcake!

[fj.livejournal.com]

Actually, before I break out the cupcake, I am going to ask my personal geologist and LA expert if I am getting things right, or if I couldn't possibly have felt the quake I just pointed to where I am.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

They assign you a personal geologist out there? Wow, I remember when it was a big deal just to have a personal trainer.

[fj.livejournal.com]

This one I found all by myself over a decade ago on the Internet. But I do not have an exclusive on him, so he may be sharing his knowledge with other people too, even if he doesn't work as a geologist.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm both his geologist and personal trainer.

- tim

[jss]

And here I thought fj did the training....

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

I'm no geologist, but having moved there shortly after the Northridge quake of 1994, I learned that yes, it's possible to feel a very weak quake (and yours there wasn't terribly deep, so that may make it more perceptible,) if you're on just the right type of foundation (soil, I presume) at the time. It's also possible that someone closer to the epicenter would not feel it, even though you did, because they're on a different soil or foundation or whatever.

The weirdest experience I had with a quake in LA was one morning when I was in a friend's apartment with about 9 other people. I and three others sat around the dining table, two were in the kitchen, and the other 4 or 5 were in the living room, maybe 10 feet away from where I was. All of us in the dining room/kitchen felt a small shudder and sway in the room, and the lamp over the dining table swang a little. Those in the living room felt nothing.

[vasilatos]

For the little ones, it also matters whether you're sitting down, walking along, focusing on something external, relaxing, etc. At our house, I tend to feel them because I'm lying in bed all the time, watching TV. People outside driving cars never feel them.

That's just the little guys. If the road falls out from under you, you're going to notice. :-(

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah. I think I heard that anything less than a 5.0 you're probably not going to feel in a car, even if it's standing still at the time.

God forbid any of us should ever have the road fall out from under us.

[(Anonymous)]

we have 2.7s most every day. unless you were right on top of it, I doubt you felt it.

[(Anonymous)]

forgot to say

- tim

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

I used to check that site once in a while, but often I was embarassed to find that it was just a big truck going by, or that I was just imagining it.
That 6.8 quake Seattle had in 2001 was quite an experience, though. Hopefully you won't get too many like that.

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

That was the strongest one I ever experienced, and I was in Portland at the time. None of the Northridge aftershocks or post-quakes or what-have-you that I felt in my 18 mos in LA came close to the movement I felt when Seattle rocked.

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that one was a doozy. I was unable to sleep for a week after it happened, and every little sound made me jump.

[dampscribbler.livejournal.com]

I was pretty stressed afterward, too. And all I felt was a gentle rocking, like suddenly I was living on a houseboat for a minute.