Wednesday, July 30, 2008

5.8, or 5.4 - whatever, it still shook us up.


thankfully no one was hurt, and very little damage occurred across la county. still, our first big earthquake since moving to to pasadena almost a year ago, and one that was felt as far away as san diego and las vegas. amazingly it was important enough for the bbc to report on it.

no, i didn't take this while the earth was shaking. i was actually in class and didn't have the camera or the sense to snap off a photo. so when i got home i tried to recreate an image that would give off the feeling of what we felt.

centinal over at foothill cities blog has some fantastic links regarding the quake. i especially like the one about the google searching done shortly after it happened.

10 comments:

Laurie Allee said...

What a creative shot, Ben. Yup, that sums up the experience, doesn't it?

THanks for the links, too. I thought this was the biggest I'd felt in at least a decade. Was this your first one?

ben wideman said...

Ya, we've felt tiny little stuff that felt like just a split-second rumble. Nothing like yesterday! Pretty exciting to get the first big one under our belts.

Kim Thomas said...

LOL! Great Pic!

ben wideman said...

Thanks Kim!

Petrea Burchard said...

Ha ha, very good. I hope it scared you, but only enough to make sure you're prepared. We're told it's not a matter of "if" but of "when" the "big one" will occur, and when that happens we may not have an infrastructure for delivery for such basics as water and food. Stock up, bolt everything down, and be sure you have a contact point outside the metro area so you can let loved ones know you're safe.

I sound like a killjoy, but I was in North Hollywood for the Northridge quake (7 miles from the epicenter) and wasn't able to make a phone call for more than a day. If my sister hadn't called at 4:20 AM before the phones went down my family would've been terrified. I had to move out of my apartment for 3 days. People died. And that wasn't "The One."

ben wideman said...

Wow, that is quite a bleak picture...

In that case is there really any point in becoming obsessed? If we have water and food on hand, yet we cannot reach it because our homes have collapsed, what good is being prepared? And prepared to do what? Start walking toward...??? If there really is going to be a "big one" (which I heard over and over on the news yesterday), it seems like we're pretty much done for anyway.

I think the most frightening thought for people is losing our technology, not our food and water. In planning for an upcoming trip I realized I needed to pack electrical cords or chargers for the camera, phone, laptop, and ipod.

Those few hours we spent without cell phone service yesterday where very insignificant, yet it felt like days without being able to contact our friends and family.

Maybe our priorities are getting out of whack.

I'm starting to ramble and vent. Amazing how an earthquake will make you think.

Petrea Burchard said...

Perhaps I scared you too much. I'm sorry. I'm not the authority, so be sure and read up on the subject.

What I've read is that we might be out some infrastructure for as much as 6-10 days. That doesn't mean your home is going to collapse. Some will, some won't. If the epicenter is, say, in Pasadena, it's not looking good. But if it's in Chino or Northridge, we have a better outlook. Still, there may not be phone service or power. Water mains could break. Roads could collapse and supplies won't get through. We may be on our own for basic things such as food, medicine, water, etc. We should prepare ourselves to take care of ourselves and reach out to our neighbors.

After the Northridge quake people were out cleaning each others' property. It was heartening.

ben wideman said...

Great point. 6-10 days would be big, but not as drastic as some natural disasters have been. Sad that it takes something awful to bring people together, but I guess that's a good thing to come out of stuff like that.

Anonymous said...

So many quakes even in many non-quake places in the last few years. Just the tip of the fault.

Signs of the times, perhaps?

ben wideman said...

life observer - are you hinting toward some kind of apocalyptic event? Care to tip us to the time of the event? Seems like we are living in a crazy time, but much of that seems to be due to the fact that we are aware of every subtle event right after it happens. I was just talking the other day about what we did before wikipedia - he mentioned that we probably just didn't know anything "back in the olden days".