Virginia Earthquake

[fredjacksonsan]

There was a 5.9 today in Mineral, VA. We're about 10 miles from there. Shook the house pretty good, got a bunch of glassware out of the cabinets, knocked pictures down and dropped the top 1/4 of the chimney into the yard. I'll try to post up pics later, right now the internet is spotty. No one was hurt that we know.

[Moppie]

I've been reading about, your chimney is the first real damage I've head of!


We had a 5.5 here the other day, I didn't even feel it.

Christchurch is still getting something that size on a regular basis.
They don't even bother reporting them on the news anymore unless at least shallow.

[Muscletang]

[Moppie]

LOL

A local news station here interviewed someone from Christchurch who is traveling in the US and was quite close to the epicenter.

He said it just felt like a small aftershock and wasn't sure what all the fuss was about.....

[Chris V]

Originally Posted by Moppie

LOL

A local news station here interviewed someone from Christchurch who is traveling in the US and was quite close to the epicenter.

He said it just felt like a small aftershock and wasn't sure what all the fuss was about.....

Well, for one, the earthquake was in an area not known for having any. It was a fairly sharp cracking type of shaking and it afected nearly the entire east coast fo the US. We don't have the large number of little fault lines that are constantly having earthquakes like the west coast does (or you guys in Aus and NZ). Also, the ground composition is different, as we on the east coast are on a granite "shelf" so to speak so the ground is affected differently than the sandy, volcanic crust under you guys or the west coast of the US (the effects are dampened out fairly quickly and dont' travel very far from teh epicenter for you or our west coast du to that ground composition).

We luckily didn't get much damage, but it wasn't something that anyone here is used to feeling at all.

[fredjacksonsan]

Yeah, what he said. ^^^

[Moppie]

Originally Posted by Chris V

We luckily didn't get much damage, but it wasn't something that anyone here is used to feeling at all.

Do you have building codes for Earth Quakes?


Here in Auckland, and in Wellington, where there is a high quake risk, we have quite strong building codes around quake resistance.
One of the things that hit Christchurch hard was their weaker building codes from a perceived lack of risk.