"Things started to sway." Like many North Coast residents, geologist Lori Dengler woke up to yesterday's earthquake. "And that means I had to get up, go downstairs and start figuring out the story."
Shortly afterward, geologist Lori Dengler was on her computer, piecing together the specifics of the temblor and figuring out if a tsunami was inbound. There wasn't. "They had that determination four minutes after the earthquake."
The distant epicenter lends itself to slower, rolling tremors, but she says that local topography created a different shake for different towns. "The thick sediments in the Eel River valley tend to amplify shaking," Dengler said. "Whereas in McKinleyville, we don't tend to get that."
In this interview with Lorna Bryant on the KHSU Homepage, Dengler talks about the Mendocino fault, where this week's next big earthquake is likely to be, and why you should start counting when the shaking starts.
RESOURCES
- Living on Shaky Ground (free copies on ground floorof SBS building next to Police Dept, or leave a message at 707
826-6019) - USGS Earthquake map
- Recent California Earthquakes (CalTech)
- Kamome: The Boat of Hope
- Humboldt Bay Tsunami Evacuation Map
- Redwood Coast Tsunami Working Group
- Pacific Tsunami Warning Center
From Dengler:
How to get tsunami text messages: The NTWC Twitter feed and/or the PTWC Twitter feed can be used to receive text messages. In the U.S. you can send a text message to 40404 with 'follow NWS_NTWC' for NTWC messages, and 'follow NWS_PTWC' for PTWC messages. If you live in Alaska, Canada, of the contiguous 48 states follow NTWC. For Hawaii and the Pacific territories, follow PTWC. To stop receiving NTWC text messages, you can text 'stop NWS_NTWC' to 40404. More at http://wcatwc.arh.noaa.gov/?page=productRetrieval.
