Mother Nature Calling

Well, that was weird. That's the first time I've ever ridden out an earthquake in my car. First reports suggest it was a 5.4 centered near Chino Hills, about 20 miles from my house.

Oops, there comes an aftershock as I'm writing this. Not strong, but enough to feel. We'll be expecting quite a few of these, and based on past events, we should expect at least one aftershock in the 4.4 neighborhood. We'll definitely feel that one.

I was driving and had pulled up to a red light and stopped, but the car didn't stop moving. It was shaking a bit side-to-side. At first I thought something was wrong with the car, and then I looked at the traffic signal and it was moving even though there wasn't any wind. Cellphone service was disrupted because I was unable to call home. DSL works (thankfully) but the home phone circuits are all busy.

Ride 'em cowboy!

I've written about earthquake experiences before - you can read it here. The USGS Earthquake map for Los Angeles is here.

The worst part of this whole experience is watching the local TV anchors as they make dumb statements and ask stupid questions. That, and the call-ins from concerned citizens who are trying to describe a scene which is completely unchanged, with the exception of their rattled nerves.

UPDATE: It's starting to get silly. All of the local TV stations have been wall-to-wall with converage for over two hours now and so far all they've been able to show is a few broken bottles and an old brick building that lost the facing. If you want to get on TV, just look around for a TV truck and I guarantee you somebody will interview you.

It is a little disconcerting that all the cellphone networks were offline for quite a while after the initial shock. The first cellphone I ever had was given me by the bank I worked for and we got them specifically because we were told they'd still work even after an earthquake had messed up the land lines. Maybe not.