We were shaken awake early this morning by what turned out to be a 5.4 magnitude earthquake. At first I thought Mike had gotten up and was walking around very heavily, because things were rattling on the dresser-top, but then I realized he was still in bed. Was it the wind? It is tornado season. But there wasn't any sound of wind. Then I realized it was a quake, similar to the one we had when I was a kid.
On the news this morning they said it was centered southeast of us near West Salem, which is a good ways away, and apparently they could even feel it up in Chicago. The Chicago newscaster said it only lasted a few seconds. Maybe that's true up there, but we had a whole long conversation while it was going on, so I think it was at least 30 seconds, with a little break, and then another 10 seconds or so.
It was interesting, but not scary at all. We never felt like we should get up and run outside. The funniest thing to me was that, in my groggy state, I kept asking myself if we should go to the basement! Wrong natural disaster....
Update: We just got bumped around again at 10:15am. The first incident occurred at 4:35am.
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6 comments:
I'm glad it wasn't scary. I grew up in California, but moved to Illinois for college. I remember refusing to have a bunk bed configuration because I didn't want to fall out of bed in case there was an earthquake. Everyone made fun of me and said there were never any earthquakes in Illinois!
Reminds me of a quake I felt when I was growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area. I had stayed up late studying and I heard the quake before I felt it. The porch creaked, then the house, then the back porch as the quake passed through. It's kind of neat as long as nobody gets hurt.
arduous, this is actually the third one here in my life-time, although one was really minor. If you experienced worse ones in CA, I can see why you didn't want to sleep in a bunkbed!
Donna, it was strange-it started slowly and then built up. Every time I thought it was gong to quit it would crank up again!
I was shocked when I heard that. Normally we all assume we OWN the earthquakes in this country. One time my parents came to visit from Texas. We were all sitting at the dinner table. All of a sudden shelves started rattling and ceiling light began waving. My 5 year old girl said to grand parents calmly, "I think it was an earthquake." My parents were quite shocked and stirred :)
Glad you are okay.
Cindy, we had another aftershock last night (Tuesday) that was strong enough to wake me up, though my husband slept through it. I'm sure these would seem quite minor to a Californian!
I hate to say that I mumbled and went back to sleep. Rather boring story there.....
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