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Stosh

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All I know is that my office was shaking pretty good for about 30 seconds, and I am not really close to Washington DC, or Virginia. I looked on the US Geological Survey site and there were reports of shaking as far north as Vermont and New Hampshire. (Actually there was one report from Chicago, but I would suspect that that person had their own personal instability going, rather than the one that was rattling the pictures on my wall.)

 

And then a few hours later I saw a headline on the CNN web site, "Magnitude 5.8 Quake Shakes Virginia, DC, NY." Hello? There's nothing between DC and NY? It sort of reminds me of that other thread where someone linked to the Jon Stewart story on the Republican front-runners, where the Fox people mentioned the candidates who came in first, second and fourth in the Iowa straw poll, and left out the third place finisher, Ron Paul. Oh well, I've gotten used to New Jersey being ignored...

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The earthquake was a novelty for us, but the upcoming hurricane is a real concern for those of us in eastern NC and VA. Not many here have lived to see a Cat 3 or 4 make a direct hit on us, and it's nothing to take lightly. We are making serious preparations, and may decide to evacuate west if the forecast doesn't improve.

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The granddaddy of all earthquakes in North America didn't happen on either coast. Back in the 1700's the Madrid Fault near St. Louis let loose and rang church bells as far away as Boston, MA. The Mississippi River ran upstream in certain places for as long as 3 days. Now there's something to think about.

 

Hunker down or get out East Coast! Safety first!

 

With Tornadoes, not much warning, but you can get out of their path if caught in the open. Otherwise head for the basement.

 

With Hurricanes, you can get out of their path, they give plenty of notice in advance.

 

With Earthquakes, well, no warnings, no place to go, just ride it out and hope for the best.

 

 

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On a serious note Irene is making her turn and tracking a little more west. FL, GA, and SC are looking OK, NC, Chesapeake, and NJ/NY looking worse. Looks pretty good she will hit somewhere between eastern NC to NY. I saw a briefing that, depending upon the scenario, that because of her large size that she pushes a lot more water (storm surge) than her size would indicate. In other words even if she skirts NC and cools off to a Cat 2 she may have a surge like a 3 or 4.

 

Or maybe not. Next 24 hours will tell. So be prepared and stay on top of info. Maybe not the best weekend to camp on L.I.

 

Good luck!

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No offense to you all who have to fix cracks in walls etc ... but the quake was a pretty innocous event. We lost four Pittsburghers in flash floods last weekend on a stretch of road that was supposed to have excellent drainage. It's a relief to have one disaster that's more novelty than threat.

 

The interesting thing was how incredulous my co-workers were when I told them we probably just felt an earthquake. I replied, "Well, if that wasn't a quake we just felt, we have a lot to worry about. Because whatever else could make the building shake like that is not gonna be good." Fortunately while I was asking some folks outside if they felt anything (they hadn't), one of them got a call from a relative asking if she felt "that."

 

Then a check of earthquakes.usgs.gov, cleared the air. Funny, how we Easterners have to get it from the internet before we'll believe it. Maybe if we watched our cockroaches more closely ...

 

Looks like 50-50 odds of the East Coast getting nailed with Irene. The Abacos (where Seabase operates) is the eye right now.

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I felt my first earthquake six months ago in Oklahoma City. It was more of one big bump than the series of shakes that I see on the news or movies. Since I'm not used to quakes, I ran outside to see if a plane had crashed at the airport across the street.

 

Barry

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