GREAT AUGUST EARTHQUAKE 2011 PART II

West Coasters are pleased to laugh at us for our “over” reaction to this earthquake, just as we would laugh at them for their “over” reaction to six inches of snow, but this is not to be taken lightly.   The Washington Monument sustains several prominent cracks (though it is not tilting as Fox News reported, but did we believe that?), the Washington Cathedral has damage that could cost in the millions of dollars to fix, and they have no insurance.   Many other buildings damaged.  Water pipes broken at Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt and Pentagon.  Roads, rails, and bridges mostly seem to be intact.  Renewed concern about the safety of nuclear reactors.  In Louisa County, officials counted four houses within five miles of the epicenter destroyed, another 65 with severe damage, and 125 with moderate damage.  Schools in the area are closed till September 12 to repair damage.  Estimates of the damage from this earthquake range from $10 to $100 million.  But that may be low-ball estimates.

Some people whose property is damaged by the earthquake may be shocked to find their homeowner insurance does not cover earthquakes.  Or other natural disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, floods—you had better check your policy now.  You probably have to buy a separate rider for these possibilities.  But good luck with that now—this earthquake probably will be cited as “pre-existing condition!”  I wonder if evacuation of the city, everyone leaving at once, was done as wisely as could be, but I don’t know if the gridlock was really that much worse than usual “rush hour” traffic.  Perhaps one of you kept track of that?  Rail service in the DC area was slowed, because of concern about damaged tracks, just at a time when it would be most needed.  What about all those government workers and others who depend on rail to get home?  There must have been a huge out flux of tourists and visitors, since all museums and monuments closed.  Do they have a plan for such contingencies?  It seems to me that some kind of rolling evacuation, dismissing an area at a time, perhaps beginning at the periphery, might be wiser.   What would they do if they had to evacuate the whole city on short notice?  Does Homeland Security just say “GO!”

So what triggered the earthquake?  Was it just time for another? 

 I heard someone say that the earthquake was caused by the Founding Fathers rolling over in their graves!

 A friend of mine quipped that it was an Act of God, in order to create more jobs for construction workers!

 Rev Pat Robertson thinks the earthquake is a sign of the end times—noting that the cracks in the Washington Monument could be a sign from God.

 Someone else thought it might be punishment for Rep Eric Cantor, in whose district  was the epicenter of the earthquake, who had said after the Joplin MO tornado, that indeed government might help with recovery effort, but that there would have to be comparable cuts in the budget elsewhere.  Indeed, after the earthquake, he appeared in his district to reassure his constituents that of course the government would help, but there would have to be cuts elsewhere to pay for the help.   

 I emailed Valerie, in Spokane, when I heard that MLKjr memorial, which was holding opening ceremonies, had to evacuate,   “ How long will it take the right wingers to say that the earthquake and Hurricane Irene are God’s  punishment for the installation of MLKjr memorial on the Washington Mall?  I think opening ceremonies were today, I understand people had to run out of the building when the earthquake hit, and the big dedication is this weekend, when Irene is likely to hit.

Watch for it…”

 But I haven’t really heard that one yet.  Although yesterday (Thursday) a commenter on a blog raised that very same question.

But more seriously [it was bound to come], the publisher of the conservative website WorldNetDaily, Joseph Farah, writes, "Washington, D.C., deserves more than the wallop it got today [because of declining morals]. It needs a much bigger shaking up than it got." And a Brooklyn rabbi, Yehuda Levin, blamed the earthquake on the growing acceptance of same-sex marriage, citing the Talmud as saying that “one of the reasons that God brings earthquakes to the world is because of the transgression of homosexuality.”  But I expect He could find plenty of transgressions that need punishing.  Why does no one ever suggest that He sends these calamities to punish us for our wars/invasions/occupations?  Or because we have the death penalty?  Perhaps he is punishing us for allowing 1% of the population to control 80% of the wealth of the country, for allowing such a disparity between the rich and the poor?  Or perhaps because our legislators are bought by corporations, or because those corporations dare to buy and own the government?  Perhaps he in punishing the oil,  gas, and coal industry for polluting our air, water, and land?   Perhaps he is just trying to wake us up to our follies in carrying our “dominion over the earth” to the extremes of destroying it ourselves, by showing that He can do it even faster?
And as to acts of man, I have read in the past that such things as constructing a dam, with all its weight, can increase frequency of earthquakes.  Such things as injection wells and fracking have been cited as causes, as recently in Arkansas.  (See http://www.readersupportednews.org/news-section2/312-16/7166-fracking-could-have-caused-east-coast-earthquake).  Perhaps, in some vulnerable areas, the mere weight of the huge cities we build.  Do we tempt fate?  I caught something in passing, about a plan to build a huge new facility at Los Alamos, but, because the ground there is volcanic ash, which is very soft, they would have to remove all of that ash and replace it with tons of concrete.

Anyway, this gives us plenty to ponder, as we await the next great catastrophe, Hurricane Irene.

GREAT AUGUST EARTHQUAKE 2011 Part I

So, what are they going to call this earthquake, which occurred at 1:51 p.m. on Tuesday, August 23, 2011, was felt in 22 eastern states, where live about one-third of the population of the United States.

The first I knew about this great earthquake was when Dale called a little after 2 p.m., from the house where she is house-sitting, in Slanesville.  “Mom, have you heard anything about an earthquake?”  She said there had been a rumble and the house started shaking, and the chandelier was swaying.  She had thought at first it might be a passing truck, but from where she was she shouldn’t have been affected by a truck passing on the county road.

I then checked google news, and tv news, and heard the account of the 5.8 category earthquake, centered in Louisa County VA, and felt in about 22 states from Georgia to Ohio, and affecting a third of the population of the United States .  People evacuating buildings everywhere, In DC and New York and elsewhere, though since then I have heard that during an earthquake you should stay inside.  But what do we Easterners know?

I had felt nothing, and in response to email and phone queries, I could find no one else on Rannells Road who had felt anything, but heard from persons in Capon Bridge, including Harry,  who was sitting in his car at Capon Bridge Market and thought there was something the matter with the car when it started shaking, and Elaine, who said: the house shuddered -- I thought maybe it was an explosion somewhere at first -- it lasted here about 40 seconds -- then, I remembered that I had felt the same thing when we lived in Vancouver, B.C. and realized it was an earthquake.  Augusta, including Mike, who has a crack in a second story ceiling where tape pulled apart, Slanesville, Kirby, Burlington, Levels, Paw Paw, Stoney Mountain, and Romney--at the Courthouse, Sheriff’s Department, and Committee on Aging.  Jersey Mountain Road.  At  Mountain Top and at the Regional Jail.  From people who had been in Cumberland or Short Gap at the time.  Rick, up Grassy Lick Road, did not feel anything, but Bill, across the road on Nathaniel Mountain, was sitting out in his tepee and thought a bear had gotten in under the floor.  Scary!    One of our Hampshire young people who is now living in Morgantown felt it there, some people had things fall, tall buildings especially felt the sway, and buildings at WVU were evacuated.  She commended the local emergency system and radio station, who were on the ball notifying people and checking up on experiences.  Someone suggested that the closer you were to a river or water source, the stronger the tremors were, can anyone else bear that out?   

Elsewhere, my son-in-law, Lloyd, at Goddard was working in the basement of the building at the time, and experienced the surreal sensation of rolling waves below him and at the same time awareness of the huge building above him.  Son Bruce and his family were in his office in a 15-story building in New York, and felt the building sway.  That passed and they went on with their work, but the Courthouse next door, and other buildings around them were evacuated.  Halle writes, from Annapolis:  I was very scared.  I was talking to someone at the front desk and I thought someone was moving stuff upstairs and then I saw the glass doors shaking and the whole building.  We went to an inner office without windows and got under a table and we could feel the floor shaking.  Then someone pulled the fire alarm so we went down the stairs (we are on the 2nd floor) and headed outside.  By then it had ended.   Halle was especially worried about her boys at home; they told her afterwards that the little dogs freaked out.  And Amy, on the bay:  My office of 25 people had just stepped onto a sailboat for a 3 hr. bay adventure (reward for working hard) when it happened and then immediately everyone got flooded with texts about it, though we felt nothing ourselves.  And yes, of course we continued our adventure. 

My brother, Jack, in Lebanon, Penn thought his wife had overloaded the washer, but when he checked, it was empty.  His wife, who was in the yard, felt nothing.    My niece, Donna, who lives about 19 miles from the epicenter of the quake, had some pictures fall off the wall and some glass breakage, but others in the area fared worse.  (See in Part 2).  Niece Tami, in Martinsburg, on the top floor of a three-story building, felt the tremor before the rumble, and a co-worker who was in the restroom at the time said all the automatic toilets flushed.  Great-nephew, Cody,  attending college in North Carolina about 350 miles from the epicenter was on the 4th floor of the Bio bldg and says the whole thing swayed for several seconds.   Elaine’s son in Richmond, who is a psychiatric social worker, was sitting with a client in his office, when things fell off the shelf, etc. He said he didn't have time to react, because he had to comfort his client who was quite shaken in more ways than one.  Her daughter in Columbia, MD, felt it at work, but others in the area did not.  My sister, Lois, in Hagerstown could see the loveseat, on which she was sitting, moving back and forth from the wall, but her son elsewhere in the same city felt nothing.  Brian, in Augusta, who had lived through earthquakes in California, ran outside and could see his house swaying.  His wife Val, working at FEMA in Winchester, says their building shook BIG TIME, they evacuated for about an hour, then returned to work.   They had to!!  They're FEMA, after all.

It is amazing to think of how such events, lasting only seconds, impinge themselves on our memories, while our minds try out and discard several theories as to what is going on, before we settle on the right one, or perhaps, only find out  later.  And though we come through unscathed, those few seconds make us feel an affinity with others, even those who may suffer far more than we do.