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Earthquake shakes Northern California
Moe
09/03/00 at 11:32:00
Earthquake shakes Northern California NAPA, Calif. (AP) -- A 5.2-magnitude earthquake hit the heart of Northern California's wine country early Sunday, injuring more than 25 people, knocking out windows, breaking gas and water mains, and shutting down power to about half of the county, police said. A 41-year-old man was in serious condition and a 5-year-old child was in critical condition after sustaining head injuries from falling objects, said Denise Mace, spokeswoman at Queen of the Valley Hospital in Napa. About 25 other people went to the hospital's emergency room with earthquake-related injuries, mostly minor lacerations, Mace said. The quake hit at 1:36 a.m. about 6 miles northwest of Napa and 6 miles northeast of Sonoma, near the small town of Yountville, according to the United States Geological Survey in Menlo Park. The shaking woke people as far south as San Francisco, some 50 miles away. California Highway Patrol spokesman Mark Bunger, who has lived in Napa County his whole life, described the quake as "by far the most severe I've ever felt. "Usually it's a rolling, but this was more of a real jolting. My wife and kids were screaming. It was quite upsetting." He said his two-story house in nearby Browns Valley sustained no major damage. "There's stuff all over the floor, a lot of cracked plaster. I was relieved it was nothing really costly." Medical technicians also responded to emergencies that appeared to be indirectly related, including reports of heart trouble, Napa Police Cmdr. Steve Geoghegan said. About 6,000 customers were without power three hours after the quake, down from a high of 10,000, according to a Pacific Gas & Electric Co. spokesman. A handful of people reported gas leaks and PG&E crews were on their way to check out those homes, Jonathan Franks said. The Napa Valley Marriott hotel in Napa was evacuated for safety reasons, according to a woman at the front desk. A few San Francisco Bay area residents cut their long weekends short and went home after the quake, she said. Bunger said Napa area roads were crowded at 2 a.m. "It looked like commute traffic on a Monday morning," he said. Geoghegan said the quake woke him and his wife: "It was like a rolling-type movement. It lasted for a few seconds. My office is trashed and my house is trashed." Kim Funk, manager of A&H Hallmark in Napa's Bel-Aire Plaza, called the earthquake "sheer terror." "At first we didn't know if someone was in the house," she said. "It was extremely loud. Everything was shaking. It felt like one of those jerky thrill rides." Her store was a mess with smashed front glass windows, broken knick-knacks, dumped shelves. She estimated the damage to be in the thousands of dollars. Dispatcher Rick Wallace of the Sonoma County Sheriff's Department in Santa Rosa, about 30 miles northwest of the quake's epicenter, said he fielded about 100 calls from residents reporting the quake and felt it himself, though the sheriff's department is in an earthquake-proof building. "We shook twice, back to back, with everything swaying, like a waterbed," Wallace said.

Re: Earthquake shakes Northern California
bhaloo
09/03/00 at 12:16:24
Asalaam alaikum wrt wb, Only 5.2? Although I live in southern California, I am familiar with earthquakes. :)  I usually sleep through them, unless they are 6.0 or greater then my eyes open if I'm sleeping.  The big ones, 7.0 and above can be pretty scary

Re: Earthquake shakes Northern California
Asim
09/03/00 at 14:25:51
Assalaamu alaikum, I have studied earthquake engineering awhile back and can tell you that the Richter scale is not a good indicator of the damage an earthquake can cause. There are many more factors involved including the source of the quake, the energy released by the quake, the transmitting media (rock type, etc), and the design of structures. Earthquakes in California are usually intense and localized in geography. A 5.2 earthquake in California is likely to cause more damage locally than the same magnitude earthquake somewhere else. I have experienced a few earthquakes in my life, fortunately none of them were very strong. Interestingly, we even had an earthquake here in Ohio back in 1998. It was 4.2 in magnitude and mildly vibrated windows. I was in my office at the time and wondered what the heck it was. I gigured it was an underground explosion because a lot of construction was going on around campus. But the next day it was in the newspapers. I hear that a major earthquake in California is overdue. A small quake is good, as it releases energy that can otherwise build up and produce a big guake. And Allah knows best. Wasalaam.
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