8.8 Earthquake in Chile [Update at #277]

KFI LA http://www.kfiam640.com/pages/jk2010.html ^

[dragnet2]

On the radio KFI LA..

[Riley]

People who are uncomfortable with public speaking tend to use the lectern as a shield. I gave classes sometimes in the service; in NCO school we were advised to come out from behind it- don’t use it as a crutch.
When I was an IT manager in professional life, I took over from another guy who used to put his desk between him and anyone in his guest chair. I turned the desk sideways so that nothing was between me and anyone who was visiting my office. I got a surprising number of positive comments about it.

I don’t know, maybe when you’re the President and you are making a public statement it is somehow different.< shrug>

[Riley]

The thing about a majority of the quakes we have had in San Diego, by the time you realize what it is, it is over.

40 year resident of the SFBA here. In an apartment complex, there's an earthquake. The building creaks and groans like it is going to fold up like a folding wine rack. Everyone in each unit opens their door and looks out at everyone else. If there's a pool in the middle of the complex, they watch the water slopping back and forth for a moment. Then the doors all close and everybody goes back to whatever they were doing before.

To us, it's something mildly interesting. 'Hey, did you feel the earthquake yesterday' watercooler fodder. Unless it's big enough to have a name. That's different.

[OrangeHoof]

I have no numbers yet I don’t doubt that earthquakes have killed more than tornadoes worldwide due to lax building codes in certain parts of the world and the few tornadoes that occur outside the central and eastern U.S.

In America, though, I think tornadoes are the deadlier force. Tornadoes rarely kill hundreds but they kill small pockets in a cluster of storms year after year on a rather steady basis. While man has built structures that limit earthquake damage, nobody has yet designed a building to limit tornado damage.

[Pylon]

I felt the Northridge quake pretty good down here. 80’s and early 90’s there were quite a few out by El Centro and the Salton Sea that were pretty big and we rolled pretty good down here but other then that I can’t remember really having a big shaker down here. I guess San Diego has been pretty lucky, we don’t really have any major faults in the city/county except for maybe the Rose Canyon fault. Our luck will run out someday though.

[Riley]

I was in the SFBA for Loma Prieta. I was on bedrock, passing over Kirker Pass between Concord and Pittsburg when it hit. I didn’t feel it. My Dad lived in Cow Hollow in the City though. I took the next day off to go look for him. That turned into a real adventure.

I’d just driven a truck over the Cypress Structure (that pancaked) earlier that same day.

[Myrddin]

I had been waiting for 3 weeks for my "test window" on the IBM mainframe. It was scheduled for 5 PM. The mainframe was in San Francisco. I was in San Diego. When the clock reached 5:08, the testers ducked under the desks and started yelling about an earthquake. It was the Loma Prieta quake. Next test window...in 3 weeks.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

85 quakes...man that is a lot of shaking....

[Strategerist]

I have no numbers yet I don’t doubt that earthquakes have killed more than tornadoes worldwide due to lax building codes in certain parts of the world and the few tornadoes that occur outside the central and eastern U.S.

The rather absurd myth that earthquakes only kill people in Third World hellholes without building codes seems to have gotten stronger after the Haiti quake. Entirely wishful thinking.

People seem to forget the 1995 Kobe earthquake in Japan killed over 5,000 people.

In America, though, I think tornadoes are the deadlier force. Tornadoes rarely kill hundreds but they kill small pockets in a cluster of storms year after year on a rather steady basis. While man has built structures that limit earthquake damage, nobody has yet designed a building to limit tornado damage.

The U.S. will have an earthquake that kills several thousand people, probably within the next 2-3 decades. It's just a matter of time. When that happens quakes will easily pull ahead of tornadoes as a cause of death in the U.S.

And even now earthquakes are a far greater cause of dollar damage in the U.S. averaged out over time; the Oklahoma City tornado did about $1 billion dollars of damage; the Northridge earthquake did about $20 billion dollars of damage.

Even California has tens of thouands of older structures that are not remotely capable of surviving a large earthquake; when you start talking about places like the Pacific Northwest, Utah, and even the East Coast (where a M 7 quake has hit Charleston SC and large quakes have struck near Boston centuries ago) it's much worse; there's even a not-inconsiderable threat to New York City.

Is a quake ever going to kill 100,000 people in the US? No. But we don't have any sort of magical technological immunity against mass deaths in earthquakes.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

I turned my TV off cause they kept beeping a Tsunami Alert...

And apparently they saw the water go in and out with the Tsunami down at Dana Point...according to the KFI radio report,,,,decided to close the restaurant there...

[Red Boots]

Thought you might like to know that my daughter did hear from her friend this evening. They are 20 mi or so inland from Concepcion, and their house survived, though everything inside is smashed. They have no electrcity, or running water, but are all ok.

[Brad’s Gramma]

No. Dana Point???? Wow....

[ReignOfError]

While man has built structures that limit earthquake damage, nobody has yet designed a building to limit tornado damage.

It's called a cellar.

Seriously, few structures can survive a direct hit from an F5 or F6 twister at full strength, just like no building can survive an earthquake if the ground under it suddenly isn't there any more. But we have a lot of years' experience at building structures to resist high winds. Hurricane construction would leave a lot more structures standing in the Midwest during tornado season -- but it's not cost-effective.

If you want building codes that will stop people from dying, forget tornadoes. Swimming pools kill more people every year.

[Quix]

Persistent reports are that years ago they revised it down to

200,000,000

to get there by force.

[Quix]

I believe you will be alive when 10’s of millions are killed by quakes in the USA within a relatively short period of time.

We shall see.

I have no doubt where you’ll file this . . . yet you will remember it at the time.

[Cvengr]

An series of seismic events could easily kill or cause the deaths of millions in the US. They could easily cause volcanic activity, tsunamis, disruption of logistical lines of communication, and destruction of water resources for population centers.

We only survive and prosper by the grace of God.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

From OC Register:

Tsunami produced 3′ waves in O.C.

**************************EXCERPTS**************************

February 27th, 2010, 12:58 am · 103 Comments · posted by Gary Robbins, science writer-editor

Geophysicist Mark Legg of Huntington Beach took this image of small tsunami waves rolling ashore at the mouth of the Santa Ana River. The largest of the waves reached 3 feet in height. There are markings on the photo because it was taken while rain was falling.

Reporting by Gary Robbins, Peter Schelden, Ron Campbell, Cindy Carcamo, Ken Steinhardt, Fred Swegles and Elysse James.

Updated 6:47 p.m.

A magnitude 8.8 earthquake off Chile that literally made the planet vibrate generated a tsunami that produced 3 foot high waves in Orange County 13 hours later, including breakers that hit storm runoff in the Santa Ana River, briefly producing small, frothy rapids.

It was the largest tsunami to hit Orange County since the Great Alaskan Earthquake of 1964, a 9.2 temblor that produce waves in the 2 foot to 3 foot range.

The tsunami, which traveled about 6,000 miles to get here, led officials to close virtually every beach in Orange County as well as most piers. Newport Beach sent automated phone calls to residents warning them to stay away from the ocean.  Parts of Dana Point Harbor were closed. The bait barge in Dana Point Harbor was broken roughly in half. The new $1 billion destroyer USS Dewey was sent out to sea from the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station to avoid being damaged.

And in perhaps the ultimate Orange County moment, some top surfers received citations because they refused to come out of the ocean during the period that the tsunami was adding to wave heights.

[!1776!]

Here's to hoping it's not earthquake weather for you...

I'm sick of the snow here - have had way to much of it this year. I'm not a fan of tornados but know how to deal with it. For me - having the ground shake even a little would ruin my week...

Take care - and by the way - have taken the kids to San Diego and it is beatiful. Kids couldn't get enough of the ocean and running around on the beaches.

All the best to you and yours.

[!1776!]

In America, though, I think tornadoes are the deadlier force.

So far - I agree, though flooding is much more dangerous.

Tornadoes rarely kill hundreds but they kill small pockets in a cluster of storms year after year on a rather steady basis.

Agreed.

While man has built structures that limit earthquake damage, nobody has yet designed a building to limit tornado damage.

For most tornados simply taking shelter in an interior room is sufficient. For slightly larger ones being in a basement under something sturdy is usually enough. For the monsters, yeah - tough to design for though possible - think safe room on steroids. Question as always - do the probabilities make doing so a responsible decision...

[Figment]

It also altered the course of the Mississippi River - and didn’t it run backwards too?

There are those that say the Mississippi River ran backwards. The more reasonable explanation is that it ran sideways for awhile. Reelfoot Lake in northwest Tennessee was formed from this. If the river had actually run backwards Reelfoot Lake would probably stretch to the Cumberland Plateau

[Cindy]

Thank you Godzilla for looking at it.

Chili has had a 9.0 and a 9.5 so I assume this is a natural occurrence.