Article 3690 of alt.sys.pdp10: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news1.best.com!newsfeed.mathworks.com!panix!news.panix.com!not-for-mail From: Rich Alderson Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp10 Subject: Seattle earthquake update Date: 28 Feb 2001 21:38:04 -0500 Organization: Systems Administration, XKL LLC, Redmond WA 98052 Lines: 19 Sender: alderson+news@panix2.panix.com Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: panix2.panix.com X-Trace: news.panix.com 983414284 20950 166.84.0.227 (1 Mar 2001 02:38:04 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@panix.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 1 Mar 2001 02:38:04 GMT X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.7 Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.sys.pdp10:3690 As many of you will have heard by now, the Puget Sound area of Washington was rocked by a fairly large earthquake at 10:54 local time this morning. The temblor was centered roughly 10 miles north of Olympia and 30 miles down. The Seattle area escaped major damage, though Seattle-Tacoma Airport was closed because all the glass in the air-traffic control tower shattering out, making it unusable. Olympia was hit much harder--visible damage to downtown buildings and a large crack in the capital dome. At the offices of XKL, in Redmond, we were very lucky. The building is fairly new (about 10 years old), so withstood the shaking; within our offices, only a few items improperly stored on top of system consoles and the like fell to the floor. I hope that all our compatriots here in the Puget Sound area were as lucky. -- Rich Alderson alderson+news@panix.com "You get what anybody gets. You get a lifetime." --Death, of the Endless Article 3692 of alt.sys.pdp10: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news1.best.com!newsxfer3.itd.umich.edu!nntp.cs.ubc.ca!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news.u.washington.edu!Tomobiki-Cho.CAC.Washington.EDU!mrc From: Mark Crispin Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp10 Subject: Re: Seattle earthquake update Date: Wed, 28 Feb 2001 22:02:25 -0800 Organization: Networks & Distributed Computing Lines: 16 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: tomobiki-cho.cac.washington.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Trace: nntp1.u.washington.edu 983426549 23490 (None) 140.142.17.39 X-Complaints-To: help@cac.washington.edu NNTP-Posting-User: pra In-Reply-To: Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.sys.pdp10:3692 On 28 Feb 2001, Rich Alderson wrote: > As many of you will have heard by now, the Puget Sound area of Washington was > rocked by a fairly large earthquake at 10:54 local time this morning. Yup, a 6.8 magnitude. > At the offices of XKL, in Redmond, we were very lucky. The same at my home (site of Panda.COM and two working 2020 systems) and office. Just some small stuff fell, no damage and nothing broken. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Article 3697 of alt.sys.pdp10: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news1.best.com!newshub.sdsu.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.mathworks.com!panix!news.panix.com!not-for-mail From: Rich Alderson Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp10 Subject: Re: Seattle earthquake update Date: 01 Mar 2001 17:45:15 -0500 Organization: Systems Administration, XKL LLC, Redmond WA 98052 Lines: 18 Sender: alderson+news@panix2.panix.com Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: panix2.panix.com X-Trace: news.panix.com 983486715 10930 166.84.0.227 (1 Mar 2001 22:45:15 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@panix.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 1 Mar 2001 22:45:15 GMT X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.7 Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.sys.pdp10:3697 One of the problems with reporting from one's own point of view is how wrong one can be. A number of older buildings in one of Seattle's historical areas were damaged, some badly, and Boeing Field has damage to the runways. Mark's home is a good deal closer to the epicenter than Redmond, so the capri- cious nature of the damage is clear. Some roads were badly damaged although further away, including one of the approach roads to my house (though not my usual route)--one rural highway suffered a break with a difference in height between the two sides of about 2 feet (60 cm). The damage estimates for the region are coming in at $2,000,000,000. But there were very few serious injuries and only one fatality (from a heart attack). Thanks to everyone for allowing this little off-topic report. -- Rich Alderson alderson+news@panix.com "You get what anybody gets. You get a lifetime." --Death, of the Endless Article 3702 of alt.sys.pdp10: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news2.best.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!canoe.uoregon.edu!logbridge.uoregon.edu!news.u.washington.edu!Tomobiki-Cho.CAC.Washington.EDU!mrc From: Mark Crispin Newsgroups: alt.sys.pdp10 Subject: Re: Seattle earthquake update Date: Thu, 1 Mar 2001 16:03:32 -0800 Organization: Networks & Distributed Computing Lines: 68 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: tomobiki-cho.cac.washington.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Trace: nntp1.u.washington.edu 983491415 21546 (None) 140.142.17.39 X-Complaints-To: help@cac.washington.edu NNTP-Posting-User: pare0 In-Reply-To: Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.sys.pdp10:3702 On 1 Mar 2001, Rich Alderson wrote: > A number of older buildings in one of Seattle's historical areas > were damaged, some badly, and Boeing Field has damage to the runways. Most of the damage was indeed to older buildings, and buildings in the industrial area (largely built on fill). Many of these old buildings have extensive masonry. Was it Boeing Field or Sea-Tac with the runway damage? > Mark's home is a good deal closer to the epicenter than Redmond, so the capri- > cious nature of the damage is clear. My understanding is that the epicenter was in the south end of Puget Sound, so between that and the great depth of the quake it was pretty far away from both of us. The quake was violent; the worst that I've ever experienced. I was just finishing breakfast when it hit. First I said "oh shit!", then I dove under the dining room table. My dog was outside on the deck, watching me through the sliding glass door, but presently decided that she really didn't want to be on a wooden deck in an earthquake and jumped onto terra (non-)firma. Stuff was shaking and knocking about. At first, I was worried about the house, but the intensity stayed about the same throughout and it became clear that the house wasn't in trouble. Then I worried about the grandfather clock -- an heirloom that I had just spent a lot of money fixing -- since I could hear it banging about. When the quake stopped, I waited a couple of seconds and got up. The electricity was still on, and I didn't smell any gas. The furnace and clothes dryer were going the whole time. The dining room chandelier was still swaying violently. So were the weights on the grandfather clock; they had knocked the door open; fortunately the latch gave before the glass did. The clock didn't work when I tried starting it again. I discovered that the quake had caused the pendulum to separate from the clockworks; the clockworks has a pin that got into a corresponding hole in the pendulum, and this pin was at the side. Simple to fix. Throughout the house, little things had fallen down and pictures on the wall were awry, but nothing was broken. It took no more than about 5 minutes to go around and set everything right. It was a similar story elsewhere on the island, although at the grocery stores they had a lot of stuff fall from the shelves and the ceiling at the Safeway partially failed. I think that they've re-opened by now. They kicked people out of the office building at UW where I work, but the damage was only a couple of loose ceiling tiles and cracked drywall over an expansion joint (OK, what ditz drywalled over an expansion joint??). But the time I arrived, the structural engineers had already OK'd the building for reoccupancy. The bottom line is that although it was a hard hit, but it was a glancing blow. There was no disaster here. By next week, I think that it'll be forgotten. Unlike SF, LA, or Kobe, this won't be a famous earthquake. > Thanks to everyone for allowing this little off-topic report. And also thanks to everybody for their good wishes. -- Mark -- http://staff.washington.edu/mrc Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate. Article 5723 of alt.tv.reboot: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news2.best.com!news.voicenet.com!feed2.news.rcn.net!rcn!newsfeed.direct.ca!look.ca!newsfeed.bc.tac.net!news.bc.tac.net!not-for-mail Message-ID: <3A9D6E4C.F8C18964@reboot.com> From: mairi welman Reply-To: mairi@reboot.com X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 (Macintosh; U; PPC) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: alt.tv.reboot Subject: Earthquake! Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Lines: 22 Date: Wed, 28 Feb 2001 13:32:02 -0800 NNTP-Posting-Host: 207.194.87.97 X-Complaints-To: news@bctel.net X-Trace: news.bc.tac.net 983396023 207.194.87.97 (Wed, 28 Feb 2001 13:33:43 PST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 28 Feb 2001 13:33:43 PST Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.tv.reboot:5723 Well, that was exciting! A weird rolling sensation, like being on a boat that is taking on a wake sideways. It was quite strong. No damage here in Vancouver except a couple of windows that blew out. Looks like Seattle got the worst of it, and apparently it was felt all the way to Salt Lake City. But...now the sun is shining, the sky is blue and , if I didn't know better, I'd say Spring has arrived! (With a bang, not a whimper... hee hee). Mairi --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mairi Welman email: mairi@reboot.com Director of Communications tel: 604-714-2600 Mainframe Entertainment, Inc. fax: 604-714-2641 500 - 2025 W. Broadway www.mainframe.ca Vancouver, BC, V6J 1Z6 --------------------------------------------------------------------------- "The only real posession we ever own is our character." Tom Wolfe Article 5727 of alt.tv.reboot: Path: nntp1.ba.best.com!news1.best.com!nntp.primenet.com!nntp.gblx.net!newsfeed.direct.ca!look.ca!newshub2.rdc1.sfba.home.com!news.home.com!news1.sttls1.wa.home.com.POSTED!not-for-mail User-Agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.02.2022 Subject: Re: Earthquake! From: World Associates Newsgroups: alt.tv.reboot Message-ID: References: <3A9D6E4C.F8C18964@reboot.com> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Lines: 53 Date: Wed, 28 Feb 2001 22:46:55 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 24.0.90.46 X-Complaints-To: abuse@home.net X-Trace: news1.sttls1.wa.home.com 983400415 24.0.90.46 (Wed, 28 Feb 2001 14:46:55 PST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 28 Feb 2001 14:46:55 PST Organization: Excite@Home - The Leader in Broadband http://home.com/faster Xref: nntp1.ba.best.com alt.tv.reboot:5727 in article 3A9D6E4C.F8C18964@reboot.com, mairi welman at mairi@reboot.com wrote on 2/28/01 1:32 PM: > Well, that was exciting! > A weird rolling sensation, like being on a boat that is taking on a wake > sideways. It was quite strong. No damage here in Vancouver except a > couple of windows that blew out. Looks like Seattle got the worst of it, Funny you should mention that. Just got through posting the following to our local Mac User Group BBS: [For those of you not familiar with the Seattle area, the Alaska Way Viaduct is an older doubledecker highway that runs along the waterfront. Recent California and Kobe quakes had similar roadways collapse, squishing cars and their occupants.] OK, so where's the one place you really wouldn't want to be during an earthquake? The lower deck of the Alaska Way Viaduct? That's where I was when it hit, between the downtown entrance and the Safeco Field exit. The car started shaking, and I thought I was getting a flat tire. Then I noticed the buildings to my left were losing pieces, chunks peeling off and falling away. The cars ahead of me started slowing down, despite my most rapid and colorful vocal urging for them to not slowdown until AFTER we were off the road. When we got to the off ramp, the light fixtures were swaying wildly, and dust was rising along First Avenue South from falling chunks. As you've all seen on TV by now, the damage was extensive. Lots of broken windows. People were pouring out of their work places, many with cell phones to their ears. Once off the ramp, I pulled over and waited for my heartbeat to slow below double-digit-beats-per-second, then drove on to my client. They are located a couple of blocks south of Safeco. The building next to theirs had a large chunk missing from the roof and top floor, the bricks littering the parking lot below. Their power was out, and about a half a dozen UPS battery back up devices were beeping. I was unable to call home, due to cell phone system overload. Since there was no work to be done, I chatted with the clients for a while, then came home. Our house was completely uneffected. Couple of crooked pictures on the wall, that's it. It was a striking contrast to the scene I came from. I love the Viaduct, and always have. I am thrilled and grateful it acquitted itself so well today. I did, however, take Elliot Way home. No use pushing it. ;-) CDW