Earthquake this morning -- WooHoo!

[W4GNS]

Agreed, I was at home and vacated my home, as I was unsure of what was happening . As I was half asleep.
The good news is the reports are no or minimal damage and no injurys. I'm 140 miles from the epicenter, and don't think I would want to be any closer.

. 5.8 this time and it was really shaking our building to the point where you weren't comfortable staying in it.

[Kuron]

I am about an 2 1/2 hour drive from the epicenter. I made wifey leave immediately as we live in a 55+ year old building, but by the time I could get the cat and get him in his pet carrier it had stopped. It went on for a bit too as it took a while to grab the cat. He didn't want none of what was going on.

We have a thin crack running down the corner of one wall from the ceiling to the floor. This crack was NOT there this morning. Although the overall damage in all areas is less than the earthquakes I felt when living in California, what I felt was worse than what I felt when in California. It was really jumping.

http://www.wbaltv.com/slideshow/news/28 ... etail.html

We have had two buildings partially collapse in Baltimore and I saw an initial report of a shopping center or grocery store in Annapolis that had its roof partially collapse. I haven't seen a follow up on this though.

What is funny is many years ago, I used to live somewhat near the epicenter. This isn't the first time that area has been the epicenter for a quake, but nothing this big. There was a small one around the mid 80s in that area when I lived there and then in the late 80s there was another one and it was discovered that the "dormant" fault near the Lake Anna nuclear power plant wasn't so "dormant" anymore. I still have family that lives in the general area.

[Nituvious]

I moved to Florida right before Elena. Elena never hit land in Florida, it just kissed Florida.

True but that kiss lasted 12 hours as the storm just sat 50 miles off the coast and pounded us with winds and rain enough to do over a billion dollars in damage. The worst part was nobody, not even the meteorologists had any idea which way the storm would would go when it started moving again.

The scariest storm for me was hurricane Charlie in 2004. I lived in Clearwater in Pinellas County at the time and until six hours before it would have made land fall it was headed directly for us. But it took a sharp turn to the northeast, crossed the state and went back out into the Atlantic, all we ended up getting was a few wind gusts and some rain.

No, not hoping for one. But since you can't change what is going to happen, you might as well experience it.

I can understand that but only to a point. If the storm was only a category 1 or 2 and I was on high ground so I didn't have to worry about the storm surge, which is what causes the most deaths in a hurricane, then yeah, I might stick around to experience it. But if the storm is a category 3 or higher or I'm in a low lying area where the storm surge or flooding is a real threat, I'll leave and go someplace a lot safer to wait out the storm.

More like hoping your belongings are still there since you are abandoning your home and leaving it unprotected from looters.

Not really, looters generally target stores where the pickings are easier to come by, breaking into a home has no guarantee of them finding anything they can turn into cash. A looter would have to be pretty desperate and likely not interested in cash to start looting homes and you'd likely only see that in devastated area and in that situation they'll be looking for things to help them survive, like food, water, etc.

I lived in Port Charlotte and got to experience Hurricane Charlie to it's fullest extent! The house I lived in only had a small Avocado tree fall into the side doing no damage. I think we were pretty lucky considering the other people in the neighborhood. I witnessed a truck tip over from the winds. It was pretty insane. Then the storms that followed it... Was like "I'm moving back to Oklahoma, F' this!" lol. We waited out the whole season, didn't leave the state, nor the city the entire time. Everyone was more worried about flooding more than the winds, though.

[Kuron]

I lived in Port Charlotte and got to experience Hurricane Charlie to it's fullest extent! The house I lived in only had a small Avocado tree fall into the side doing no damage. I think we were pretty lucky considering the other people in the neighborhood. I witnessed a truck tip over from the winds. It was pretty insane. Then the storms that followed it... Was like "I'm moving back to Oklahoma, F' this!" lol. We waited out the whole season, didn't leave the state, nor the city the entire time. Everyone was more worried about flooding more than the winds, though.

an Okie? Boomer Sooner! I think I would rather have a hurricane over the tornadoes in Oklahoma. Of course the last hurricane we had hit here in Maryland (2003 IIRC), we lost our power for two weeks.

There is no ideal place to live. No matter where you live, Mother Nature will find a way to tell you to get the F*** out!

[Rings]

best of the bests SIR:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/08/23/v ... dget-cuts/

[Zach]

I grew up in Maryland (left in 2002) and never experienced so much as a ripple.

Figures something like this would happen when I'm long gone

[W4GNS]

I live in SouthWestern Virginia, and overall, were blessed with none fatal attacks of mother nature, asumming you don't live in lowlands near water.
I have seen the destruction of tornado's in the midwest, and hurricanes in the coastal regions, and it's not pretty. I spent a considerable amount of time in California when I was a working grunt and got lucky and was never there during eath quakes.
Overall I think southern Virginia is a safe place to call home.

Foot note: The folks in Utah and Nevada have un eventful weather to the best of my knowledge

[quote="KuronThere is no ideal place to live. No matter where you live, Mother Nature will find a way to tell you to get the F*** out![/quote]

[Nituvious]

I lived in Port Charlotte and got to experience Hurricane Charlie to it's fullest extent! The house I lived in only had a small Avocado tree fall into the side doing no damage. I think we were pretty lucky considering the other people in the neighborhood. I witnessed a truck tip over from the winds. It was pretty insane. Then the storms that followed it... Was like "I'm moving back to Oklahoma, F' this!" lol. We waited out the whole season, didn't leave the state, nor the city the entire time. Everyone was more worried about flooding more than the winds, though.

an Okie? Boomer Sooner! I think I would rather have a hurricane over the tornadoes in Oklahoma. Of course the last hurricane we had hit here in Maryland (2003 IIRC), we lost our power for two weeks.

There is no ideal place to live. No matter where you live, Mother Nature will find a way to tell you to get the F*** out!

Yeah, that's understandable haha. I moved to Vermont a few years back and am here now and now I'm like "So, I've lived through -32 F weather and now another hurricane... DAMN IT!".
This year is going to be ridiculous.