I had just stepped out of the shower yesterday (getting a bit of a late start, yes) when the building began to shake. We're on the ninth floor of a twelve-story building in downtown Los Angeles, so it was quite exciting there for a while -- the ground shook for maybe twenty seconds, the cat scampered under the bed, and an item or two had to be rescued from imminent spillage off of bookshelves. (Our cat has her own blog, so it usually takes quite a shock to drag her away from the internets.) But a minor earthquake overall, just 5.4 on the Richter scale. No significant damage, even closer to the center (we were about 30 miles away). The interesting thing is that within seconds after the event you could hop to the US Geological Survey page to find a map of all the world's recent earthquakes, and then home in on this one. Obviously most of the information is computer generated, although the main page for the earthquake does reassure you that "This event has been reviewed by a seismologist." So you can check out the Shake Map, of course:
We're right on top of the dot labeled "Los Angeles." But you can also find Google maps, travel times for the shocks,
and of course -- waveforms!
Earthquakes are so much better with science. The only downside is that I spent the immediate aftermath looking for the kitty rather than drying my hair, so I went through the rest of the day with the dreaded "earthquake hair."
