Saturday, April 28, 2007

Something else to talk about

There's been an earthquake in Folkestone. Sounds like a line in Yes, Primeminister, doesn't it? BBC Radio Kent, doubtless grateful to have some news for once (actually, Kent seems to get it bad - the worst of flooding, the worst of the '87 hurricane) have been talking about it non stop for about 4 and a half hours.

Four and a half hours for something that lasted about 15 seconds??!!

OK, so you have to think about context and probability. We have had earthquakes of more than 4 before, but not very often. We get 'baby' ones every 6 months or so, but only dogs and the extremely alert feel them. As we are merely on the Eurasian plate, and not even the edge of that plate, an earthquake is an earthquake as far as we're concerned. I love to go to the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program website to get it into context of just how minor our big event was.

Have a gander at this. The stake was driven through the tyre by a tsunami caused by the Prince William Sound Earthquake of 1964.

We got it easy. Talk about important stuff please.

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