Earthquakes?

2:12 am
10:53 pm...

First one was 4.7 with several after shocks, near the town of Prague, OK, about 50 miles north east of here.

The one tonight was 5.6, about 5 miles closer, near the town of Sparks....and it seemed to last almost a minute: 10:53 when I first looked at the clock, and 10:54 when the shaking stopped. The whole house shook. They are saying there could be aftershocks as strong as the one from this morning.

Scary.

The most recent report I heard was that this one tonight was the strongest one ever in this state. They're saying there are no injuries, but that there are roadways that are buckled, and chimneys that collapsed close to the epicenter.

Dave slept through the 2 am one, but I woke him up for this one, because it was so much more intense and long.

He rolled over and went back to sleep. I have not slept well for many nights, and I had just started to fall asleep.....but now I am WIDE awake.... sigh....

The news had a specialist on from the USGS who said that the quake this morning was possibly a "foreshock" of the bigger one tonight. That was interesting...I'd never heard that term before. The news lady said the same thing.

He also said that 5.6 is considered, on global average, to be pretty small to medium in severity, but that folks in places that regularly get shaken, like Japan, Chile, etc, think that the 5 range is small potatoes.

The USGS guy said that sometimes things fall off of shelves, or free standing objects fall over, but the damage is almost always very minor, even close to the epicenter, when the quake is in the 5's.

Guess he didn't hear about the buckled roads and collapsed chimneys out in Sparks!