15 years ago today...

[azure]

Lest we begin to think man is more powerful than Nature, December 26, 2004 is a day that should remind us that we are not. Those who survived will not soon forget.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake_and_tsunami

This was a monster, third largest quake ever recorded, magnitude above 9.1, maybe as high as 9.3, and generated the worst tsunami on record. The total death toll was on the order of 200,000.

 

[Busflyer]

Can’t believe it’s been 15 years already

 

[Tom-D]

 

[Velocity173]

Good movie.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Impossible_(2012_film)

 

[azure]

And that one was an even bigger monster... second most powerful quake on record.

I'd forgotten that at that time, plate tectonics was still an emerging theory... so they really didn't understand, at first, what had caused it.

 

[DavidWhite]

And that one was an even bigger monster... second most powerful quake on record.

I'd forgotten that at that time, plate tectonics was still an emerging theory... so they really didn't understand, at first, what had caused it.

I remember reading an account from a little girl who watched a fissure open up and swallow her brother, then close around him. It gives me chills just thinking about it.

I've been through a couple 7.0+ and they are pretty unnerving.

Also a point of mention - the tallest wave ever recorded also happened in Alaska after a 7.8 earthquake. If you fly over it you can still see where the trees were wiped out in '58. Trippy.

As to the OP - I remember watching this on the news when I was a kid. It sure doesn't feel like 15 years ago.

 

[Zeldman]

I've been through a couple 7.0+ and they are pretty unnerving.

I think it takes at least a 4.5 to be felt, I could be wrong.

I spent a summer in Denali National Park. We would hear the earthquake noise, then feel the tremors. And yeah, unnerving when the very earth I depend on starts shaking. Don't know if it is a minor tremor or the start of something big.

 

[NealRomeoGolf]

I think it takes at least a 4.5 to be felt, I could be wrong.

I spent a summer in Denali National Park. We would hear the earthquake noise, then feel the tremors. And yeah, unnerving when the very earth I depend on starts shaking. Don't know if it is a minor tremor or the start of something big.

The ones I felt living in Cali were only 4.3ish. Wikipedia says you can start feeling in the 3’s.

 

[azure]

The ones I felt living in Cali were only 4.3ish. Wikipedia says you can start feeling in the 3’s.

That's my understanding too. There were several in the 3-4 range while I lived in Michigan, and I knew people who said they felt them. I never did though. I think they're even rarer here in Vermont.

Not sure I would be comfortable living in areas that are prone to big ones, especially near slip faults that are overdue for releasing stress, e.g. San Andreas Fault.

 

[Ghery]

The aftershocks from the Loma Prieta quake in 1989 allowed me to calibrate what it takes to wake me up. At least a 5.0. Our house in south San Jose was about 6 miles from the epicenter of that 7.1 (or 6.9, depending on which report you believe) quake. The MSM kept calling it the San Francisco earthquake, but SF was about 50 miles from the epicenter. The architect who designed the seismic upgrade to the building I was in when it hit was killed in the collapse of the Cypress Street freeway in Oakland. The wife of a second cousin was one of the people pulled alive from that collapse. If it hadn't been for that upgrade to the building I was in in Cupertino I probably wouldn't be here today as it likely would have pancaked on us.

Earthquakes are nasty things.

 

[DavidWhite]

I think it takes at least a 4.5 to be felt, I could be wrong.

I spent a summer in Denali National Park. We would hear the earthquake noise, then feel the tremors. And yeah, unnerving when the very earth I depend on starts shaking. Don't know if it is a minor tremor or the start of something big.

I've felt a few that were around 4. I was over at my buddies house watching football and drinking beer when his girlfriends cat started to go absolutely ballistic - we both remarked on how odd this was as the cat was normally pretty sedate. At most a minute later we had a pretty decent 5.5 shaker.

The aftershocks from the Loma Prieta quake in 1989 allowed me to calibrate what it takes to wake me up. At least a 5.0. Our house in south San Jose was about 6 miles from the epicenter of that 7.1 (or 6.9, depending on which report you believe) quake. The MSM kept calling it the San Francisco earthquake, but SF was about 50 miles from the epicenter. The architect who designed the seismic upgrade to the building I was in when it hit was killed in the collapse of the Cypress Street freeway in Oakland. The wife of a second cousin was one of the people pulled alive from that collapse. If it hadn't been for that upgrade to the building I was in in Cupertino I probably wouldn't be here today as it likely would have pancaked on us.

Earthquakes are nasty things.

We had a 7.1 last year here and most of the damage was from soil liquefaction and water damage from broken pipes inside of buildings. 0 fatalities with an epicenter 10 miles from downtown anchorage. There was an immediate 5.7 aftershock as well.