I’m seeing that a 5.8 earthquake was felt from Boston to Virginia this afternoon. Here in my undisclosed location north of the Bronx I didn’t feel tremors at all. Now I see the epicenter was northwest of Richmond. Just minor damage, I suspect.
There was another earthquake in Colorado last night. If I were superstitious I’d be nervous.
Update: Oh, please … the terminally useless Jim Hoft posts the headline —
Earthquake Rattles Washington DC – Obama Goes Biking
There are no reports of structural damage in D.C. I understand some people living near the epicenter suffered broken china. Next … Obama’s Katrina?
Update: Who was first to blame Obama? It might have been Kos diarist.
Righties can’t decide is the President was too busy golfing or biking to stop the earthquake. Hey, if he can stop earthquakes, why can’t he golf and bike at the same time?
Update: Great earthquake tweets.
Update: Stunning photos of earthquake damage! Oh, the humanity …
Update: Spotted on Facebook — this afternoon Republican congressional leaders announced that the Virginia seismic region will be renamed “Obama’s Fault.”
Earthquakes are continuous and have been occurring since the beginning. Not usually cause for alarm.
I’m on the 17th floor of an 18-story building. I felt my desk and chair moving. A stack of VHS tapes began swaying. I thought maybe it was something to do with the water tower construction on our roof.
I didn’t feel a thing. Neither did my sister across the river, though I heard callers from Rhinebeck on the radio, about 30 miles north of me, tell stories about feeling it.
The largest fault on the entire east coast, if I remember correctly from my anti-nuke protesting days, runs along the Hudson River, right by, if not directly under, Indian Point, a nuclear power plant that feeds power to NY City.
I’m thankful that this happened in the mountains of VA – coincidentally, right by another nuclear power plant.
Actually, let me take that back. There’s little or no coincidence involved, since something like 98% of the US nuke plants are built right on top of, or adjacent to major fault lines.
Why?
WFT knows, except that major fault lines run along river lines, whose water is used to cool the plant’s rods. Those fault line may be the very things responsible for the path of the rivers.
All I know is, that this, and what just happened in Japan, ought to make us wake up about nuclear energy, which more and more politicians of both parties are trying to less as a cheap, clean alternative to oil, coal, and the recently ‘dirtified’ natural gas.
Ask the people of Japan who live within 100 miles of that horror show about how safe they feel about nuclear energy.
I just checked; there are 15 nuclear power plants in the New Madrid Fault seismic zone. Here is why this is a problem.
I’m sure it was caused by Obama moving his Teleprompter.
Good article:
http://gcn.com/Articles/2011/08/23/East-Coast-earthquakes-a-rarity.aspx?Page=2
I live on the west coast; and earthquakes have been a part of my life. There was a big Alaska earthquake on a Good Friday when I was in my teens. We felt it in Tacoma, Washington. I was in church and the light fixtures moved ominously. However, it was, of course, much worse in Alaska. We had one in the summer when I was between second and third grades. My Mom, other siblings, and I were outside and that was the first time I saw the earth move. I was scared; but, Mom had us gather around her. Of course, I know now that would hardly have helped in a really big earthquake. However, the more I think about it, it could have been Obama’s fault except I don’t think he was born then. And, then, there is the St. Andreas fault in California. The Big One is supposed to cause all of California south of the fault to slide into the Pacific Ocean, which I think is adequate punishment for the state that gave us Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Now, if only Texas would slide into the Gulf of Mexico–a deserving fate for the state that gave this country George W. Bush.
The damage photos are hilarious!
More tweets:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/08/23/top-tweets-about-the-east-coast-earthquake/?hpt=hp_t1
(I confess to laughing really hard at “so he compromised at 5.8.” It was a slightly bitter laugh.)
As an expat Californian, I would react to a less than six as minor, having been caught on the toilet during a six point somethin’ and being 20 ft underwater in L.A. Harbor during a 5,something, which REALLY gets your attention.
Obama and his family should have been directing traffic or somethin’ I guess.
WTF????
I was in the woods most of the day and didn’t feel a thing, but my wife said there was a tremor that shook the building she works in quite noticeably, for what seemed a long time. I realize the Earth trembling is disconcerting and tends to distort one’s sense of time. This is the North Carolina Piedmont. I guess to some tectonic plates are “just a theory” too.
I, too, was born and raised on the West Coast, so have a somewhat relaxed view of all this.
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I was sitting in the grass in a park in Chapel Hill NC and didn’t feel a thing. We were watching a Cicada Killer circling the children, and may have been distracted.
“A cicada killer circling the children, and may have been distracted”
THAT sounds pretty serious!
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