So, like everyone else in the country, I felt the ‘quake’ at 1am this morning. Was just about to take the dog upstairs (our stairs are too steep for him, since his various operations, anyhow). I was standing at the bottom of the stairs, with the dog under my arm when all of a sudden it came.
I heard it first – a loud rumble apparently emanating from the roof and I automatically thought that the bad winds and weather had finally taken their toll on our battered roof, and then felt the strangest sensation of the floor seemingly moving underneath me! Stood completely still throughout the 5-10 seconds, involuntarily frozen. I guess it’s akin to the actions of a rabbit when it sees the headlights… Very curious for a sleepy geek at 1am!
Emma’s already in bed, but awake and as I get up the stairs, she’s already poking the internet to find out what the hell just happened. At this point, I still thought I was going to go up into the office and see the open skies. I checked out upstairs, which was thankfully fine, whilst Emma hit the tome of all Sheffield’s internet knowledge (the signal to noise ratio on there is utterly incredible, it must be something like 1:5000!) to see if anyone else had ‘felt’ this.
It was only after reading the posts of similarly bemused Sheffielders that we breathed a sigh of relief and realised that it was in fact an earthquake, and not our roof collapsing!
In the morning, it seems that the ‘quake is all that’s on anyone’s lips. By lunchtime, it’s all done to death and I’m bored of hearing about it! The media coverage is even more sensationalist than when they go mad over bad weather, or, leaves on the line. As a very good chum of mine remarked on IRC – “minor tremors, the new light frost”.
I think the London Evening Standard said it, erm, worst – “EARTHQUAKE HITS LONDON“. Yes, righto, dear. The ‘quake was near Market Rasen, 150 miles north of London. At the epicentre, it measured 5.2 on the Richter scale – which is pretty high for the UK – but 150 miles away, the effects would be significantly lesser. Hardly a national catastrophe!
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