Irish Trojan in Tennessee

Arr.

By Brendan Loy

The green flash.

Earthquake! Earthquake!

By Brendan Loy

Via Brian Neudorff, here's a YouTube clip of an Evansville meteorologist live on the air during the earthquake this morning:

Heh. Cool.

He remains calm, but you can tell he was flustered by the quake from the way he just reads the numbers without in any way indicating what they mean: "We're at 73 and 50, 68 and 44 here, 87 and 26." Huh? I also like how he keeps saying the word "here." Sort of like Wolf Blitzer, Wolf Blitzer, except with a better excuse. :) All in all, though, a pretty good job of keeping his cool.

Anyway, catching the earthquake live on camera reminds me of the time, freshman year at USC, when I was awakened around 3:00 AM by the Hector Mine Earthquake, whereupon I promptly jumped out of bed and called Hillary Clinton rushed over to my camcorder in hopes of getting it started while the room was still shaking. I didn't quite succeed, but I did get footage of the lights flickering while I, looking rather wide-eyed, announced to the camera, "Earthquake! Earthquake!"

Hector Mine was a strong but distant quake; it had a magnitude of 7.1, but was centered out in the desert and caused little damage, none to speak of in the Los Angeles area. My scarier earthquake experience came two years later, with a much smaller tremor that was much nearer by: a magnitude 4.2 quake centered in Beverly Hills on September 9, 2001. (Yeah - far worse things were less than 48 hours away.) It was a Sunday afternoon, the second week of the semester, and I was all alone in the library (!), two floors below ground level. To be precise, I was in the stacks of Doheny Library -- which, coincidentally enough, had just reopened after being earthquake-retrofitted -- sitting near the far wall, with several long, tall rows of books between me and the exit. All of a sudden, everything, including the overhead lights and the bookstacks, started to shake.

Having taken a geology class about earthquakes the previous semester, I knew this was either a) a weak (or distant) earthquake, or b) the weaker P-waves of a strong earthquake, whose destructive S-waves would arrive shortly thereafter. When the shaking stopped (after maybe 15 seconds), I was momentarily paralyzed by indecision: should I make a dash for the door, in hopes of escaping before the S-waves arrive and potentially knock the bookstacks over, but putting myself in greater danger if the S-waves hit while I'm running directly past the stacks? Or should I wait it out and hope those weren't just P-waves (and/or that the building's earthquake retrofit was really good)? I chose the latter course, and after a couple of minutes, I concluded correctly that there would be no more shaking. I then promptly got the hell out of there. Being alone in an underground room surrounded by heavy objects during an earthquake is creepy.

I'm pretty sure I never studied in the Doheny stacks again.

P.S. I also sorta kinda experienced the 1988 Saguenay earthquake. I was seven years old, bounding around the house -- as was my wont at seven years old -- on a Friday evening (~6:46 PM), while my mom was sitting on a chair in the living room. (My dad was, I think, at work. It was the day after Thanksgiving, but that had been a presidential election year, so he would have been super busy working on the Statement of Vote.) We were dog-sitting for my aunt and uncle's old dog, Rusty, at the time, which is significant because Rusty was sleeping under or behind the chair that my mom was sitting on. Suddenly my mom felt a slight but distinct shaking. At first, she figured that Rusty must be shaking the chair somehow, but then she looked and saw that he was sound asleep. (So much for animals anticipating earthquakes!) A minute or two later, one of our neighbors knocked on the door to ask if we'd felt it, too. It was then that my mom realized it was probably an earthquake. 

Alas, the reason I say "my mom felt" and "my mom realized" is because I didn't feel a darn thing. I was so busy bounding around the house, making a ground-shaking ruckus in my own right by being a rambunctious seven-year-old boy, that I didn't even notice the slight shaking from the earthquake. Needless to say, I was sorely disappointed when I realized that I'd missed the earthquake. Harumph.

Fear! Fire! Foes! Awake! 5.2 earthquake rattles Midwest, felt in Tennessee

By Brendan Loy

A 5.2-magnitude earthquake centered near the southern Illinois-Indiana border rattled several states this morning, including Tennessee. Becky and I didn't feel anything; the quake happened at 5:37 AM EST, when we were still asleep, and it didn't rouse us. But some East Tennesseeans were awakened by the distant tremor.

Here's a map showing the epicenter, and another map showing where people have reported feeling the quake, and how strongly (close-up here):

If you're a Californian wondering how on earth something a puny as a 5.2 quake (or "temblor," as you guys say out there) could be felt so strongly, and in places as far afield as Chicago and Knoxville, it's because, as explained here, "seismic waves in the East travel farther and pack more destructive punches." The exact reason for this phenomenon is a topic of much debate among scientists, but "one explanation is that eastern geology is older and simpler, with fewer faults in the ground to slow the travel of quake waves." See also here:

Earthquakes in the central and eastern U.S., although less frequent than in the western U.S., are typically felt over a much broader region. East of the Rockies, an earthquake can be felt over an area as much as ten times larger than a similar magnitude earthquake on the west coast.

That point is graphically illustrated here.

Of course, this morning's mini-quake is nothing compared to the Big One that will someday destroy Memphis and cause massive devastation all across the region.

P.S. Brian Neudorff has more, and some history.

P.P.S. Ann Althouse felt it. (Hat tip: InstaPundit, who didn't.)

U.K. church boycotts all weddings to protest ban on gay marriage ceremonies

By Brendan Loy

Here's an interesting Newington story that has nothing to do with my hometown (though I did find it via my Google News Alert for "newington"). It's from jolly old England:

Newington Green Unitarian Church, which the 18th century feminist Mary Wollstonecraft once attended, has announced it will not hold marriages until it is able to conduct civil partnerships for gay couples. ...

At the moment, the law bans any religious service from taking place during a gay civil partnership.

Minister Dr Andrew Pakula, who will only conduct services of blessing at Newington Green until this is changed, said: "We will have no legal weddings until we can conduct the same equal ceremonies for all couples - including same-sex couples."

It's pretty incredible to me that churches can be legally banned from doing as they please in this regard.  I, of course, completely agree with the council member who stated: "I wouldn't advocate the law being changed to force churches to do gay marriages but if they wanted to do it, then the law shouldn't prevent it." Obviously. But I guess freedom of religion is "an American concept," too?

Idiot drives bus into bridge

By Brendan Loy

Maybe dashboard GPS devices should come with a warning label that reads, "You still have to look at the road, dumbass":

The driver of the bus carrying the Garfield High School girls softball team that hit a brick and concrete footbridge was using a GPS navigation system that routed the tall bus under the 9-foot bridge, the charter company's president said Thursday.

Steve Abegg, president of Journey Lines in Lynnwood, said the off-the-shelf navigation unit had settings for car, motorcycle, bus or truck.

Although the unit was set for a bus, it chose a route through [Seattle's] Washington Park Arboretum that did not provide enough clearance for the nearly 12-foot-high vehicle, Abegg said. The driver told police he did not see the flashing lights or yellow sign posting the bridge height.

"We haven't really had serious problems with anything, but here it's presented a problem that we didn't consider," Abegg said of the GPS unit. "We just thought it would be a safe route because, why else would they have a selection for a bus?"

"It" presented a problem? The GPS unit is the problem? Really?!

Well anyway, no one was seriously hurt, thank God. And, having said that: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Said Garmin spokesman Ted Gartner: "The bigger comment here is that drivers always need to obey all the rules of the road at all times. Stoplights aren't in our databases, either, but you're still expected to stop for stoplights." LOL!

The best part about this is, it wasn't even close. Remember the truck that six inches too tall for the Lincoln Tunnel? Well, at least that was only six inches. This bus was three feet too tall to fit under the bridge! Here's the photo evidence:

A local RV seller is quoted in the P-I story as saying, "If this guy was a professional driver, he should have known his bus was 12 feet high and couldn't fit into a 9-foot box." A professional driver?? If this guy was a trained monkey, he should have known that! It doesn't exactly take a genius to realize, as you're approaching a bridge, that the vehicle you're driving is way, way too tall to clear the bridge.

The Seattle Times has more, including word that the bridge wasn't structurally damaged. The Times also mentions that, on top of everything else, the softball team lost the game it was returning from, 10-0. Oh, and they give the driver's name, Brad Adams. I actually kind of feel bad for the guy. He must be so freakin' embarrassed. Not to mention prayerfully hoping that none of those softball players develop injuries that would make for a good claim of damages in a negligence lawsuit...

(Hat tip: David K.)