Earthquake in CA

[EDC1977]

Ginny, your friend from Kansas will take tornadoes over earthquakes? Both acts of God are a given but many of the quakes I can recall have been good and scary, but not devastating. Modern construction technology has helped a lot in that dept. Unless you're sitting on the epicenter and your house is real old, chances are good you'll come out fine, just rattled.
  Compare that to say a EF3 or EF4 tornado that happen anually and sometimes, many in just a month. You see it coming, you know it's coming, you get out and leave, come back to a foundation where your beautiful home once was. Rebuild it and pray another doesn't come your way the following year.
Both are life changing events, all goes according to where you live!

[ginxxxx]

My thoughts, exactly.  It has to be so scary with storm warnings days ahead of the event.  I'm afraid I'd be living in my basement with a six-pack.  Or lots of six-packs.  Doesn't matter if there's ice.

[MikeA]

My thoughts, exactly.  It has to be so scary with storm warnings days ahead of the event.  I'm afraid I'd be living in my basement with a six-pack.  Or lots of six-packs.  Doesn't matter if there's ice.
Well, personally, I don't want to deal with either Tornados or Earthquakes.  But we in Kansas appreciate the warnings.  We pretty much ignore the "watches".  That just means that in general, conditions are favorable that a Tornado might form but there has been no rotation spotted either by radar or by trained Storm Watchers.Now "Warnings" are a different.  That means that something has been seen rotating from a wall cloud.  Those warnings can come anywhere from ZERO minutes to as much as an hour depending on whether the funnel is forming over your house or southwest of you.Whatever the case, when a Warning comes you do several things if you are a Kansan depending on the circumstances:CIRCUMSTANCE 1:  You are in the projected Path:1.  Make sure there are no skates or tricycles on the stairs to the basement2.  Grab a six-pac as GIN suggested, grab your camera go outside and find the most open view to the Southwest so you can get pictures to send in to the Weather Channel.CIRCUMSTANCE 2:  You are NOT in the projected path:1.  Grab Camera and Beer as in CIRCUMSTANCE 12.  Get in car and drive to projected path so you can get pictures to send in to the Weather Channel.3.  NOTE:  In CIRCUMSTANCE 2 one does not need to clear the stairs in one's own home but it does help a little to find a side road heading at 90 degree angles to the path of the storm.  Since all roads in Kansas are straight and run directly north and south, and since Tornados generally travel from Southwest to Northeast, this is an impossible task!It's PARTY TIME!  But seriously, it is very unusual NOT to have ample warning if you heed it, to get into a protected area before you are caught in a life threatening situation.  Between warnings flashing constantly about a tornado hitting 500 miles away from where you live, Storm Chasers being broadcast live on TV and RADIO, and Tornado Warning Sirens BLARRING all over the city, you would have to be deaf dumb and blind NOT to be aware of a tornado in your vicinity.  

[marie meijer]

NICE post, Mike. Good info and proof once again that those from the MidWest have a sense of HUMOR, necessary for survival! 'Especially when it comes to weather. 'Very old expression in MI, if you don't like the weather, stick around, it'll change in five minutes. That's probably why Faygo moved out of state!  D@#%, someone left the sprinkler on all night, again. Sure don't wanna see our water bill, again! Do PM Mike if you need the site of his fun and interesting new forum and let him know if you're into VP, GOLF or MUSIC or all of the above!

[Nancy J.]

Over the last 120 years there has been a PATTERN of earth quakes in what is now called California.
Las Vegas will be beach front property one day. Remember you heard it here first.It's a good thing I live way over on the right side of California. Beachfront Sierras.  Has a nice ring to it.

[MikeA]

NICE post, Mike. Good info and proof once again that those from the MidWest have a sense of HUMOR, Did you think that was "humor" Marie?  Heck, that's the reason I bought a digital camera!It is funny is a sadistic sort of way.  When the "big one hit" back in '91 here in Andover, I'd been out flying a high performance kite no more than an hour before the tornado hit.  When the sirens went off, I could look around at my neighbors and like me, all were out straining our eyes to the southwest.When it came in sight, it was so big and the wall cloud was so low to the ground that none of us recognized it until we could see debris flying around it.  That one was an F5 (it was before they changed the ratings to the more liberal ones in use today...an EF5 is not necessarily as strong as one of the old F5's).Unfortunately, those in the Mobile Home Park were doing the same thing except they didn't have basements to crawl into.  There was one large community storm shelter but most of the spectators were by their mobile homes and didn't have time to get to the shelter.  There were 13 deaths resulting from that one!

[faygo]

 D@#%, someone left the sprinkler on all night, again. Sure don't wanna see our water bill, again! 
 
marie the Detroit water is a real bargain, I can assure you.  These folks down here, while they a surrounded by water, think it is made out of Gold!  Detroit water is also softer and better tasting. It also doesn't precipitate out into the Hot Water Heater into a sticky gooey mess that requires one to dismantle the HW tank every six months and clean it so it don't explode. This junk collects on the Thermal Rod rendering it totally ineffective at sensing that the water is already too damm hot.
This is probably more than you needed to hear but it gave me a chance to vent.

[marie meijer]

Oh faygo, it warms my heart to see you DO have something positive to write about the greater Detroit metropolitan area, after all, even if it is in the water genre! I will spare you the latest water bill hikes! I see we are guilty of doing that h-hop thingy again-get over it!

[ginxxxx]

[QUOTE=marie meijer]NICE post, Mike. Good info and proof once again that those from the MidWest have a sense of HUMOR, Did you think that was "humor" Marie?  Heck, that's the reason I bought a digital camera!It is funny is a sadistic sort of way.  When the "big one hit" back in '91 here in Andover, I'd been out flying a high performance kite no more than an hour before the tornado hit.  When the sirens went off, I could look around at my neighbors and like me, all were out straining our eyes to the southwest.When it came in sight, it was so big and the wall cloud was so low to the ground that none of us recognized it until we could see debris flying around it.  That one was an F5 (it was before they changed the ratings to the more liberal ones in use today...an EF5 is not necessarily as strong as one of the old F5's).Unfortunately, those in the Mobile Home Park were doing the same thing except they didn't have basements to crawl into.  There was one large community storm shelter but most of the spectators were by their mobile homes and didn't have time to get to the shelter.  There were 13 deaths resulting from that one![/QUOTE]I remember talking to my Wichita friends after that.  Most of them seemed to take it in stride, describing driving around after it hit.  I think you have to have a good brave sense of humor plus a good little camera.  One friend emailed a picture that looked like it was right out of Twister".  (I would have missed that shot, being stuck in the basement with my six-packs.) It's interesting that they changed the rating system..would you say it's sort of like Macy's changing the dress sizes so that a regular size eight now is a six or four.  The size is the same, the rating is just expanded.

[MikeA]

Tornado RatingI'm not real sure GIN.  I think it had to do more with considering things like damage and size as well as wind speed to make the ratings more objective.