Wednesday, June 23, 2010

I Reported Toronto Earthquake to USGS at 1:44 Local Time



At 1:42 PM local time a 5.5 magnitude earthquake rumbled through Leslieville in east end Toronto. The earthquake was centred nearly 600 miles to the north east. About fifty miles north east of Hull Quebec (USGS event map), the sister city to Ottawa, Ontario, Canada's capital city.

Here on the unstable Don River delta, in downtown Toronto - about a mile from "The Fence" around the G20 Summit - things really moved! The TV on my little side table shook - but didn't move off its' stand. The shaking lasted about a minute it seemed to me.

I've never experienced an earthquake but I'd also never experienced anything like this either, so after the shaking stopped I clicked the USGS bookmark in my browser to see if the event was on the map there, it was not, so I reported it, as did 1768 other Torontonians.

As the questions came up step by step in the USGS "Did you feel it?" questionnaire, my answers reveled to me, that yes, I had just experienced an earthquake.

About 50 minutes later I checked back at the USGS website and Boing! There it was, a big red square indicating an earthquake in the last hour - magnitude 5.5!


(Click on the map to go to USGS MAP - North America Region)



mh

2 comments:

  1. Hey guys
    I was very scared
    Iwas at work when i found this link:
    http://june23earthquake.com/

    ReplyDelete
  2. I was very scared too, so I invented a conspiracy theory to calm myself down. ;)

    ReplyDelete