Students shaken by California's recurring earthquakes
Thomas Currey
Issue date: 9/24/09 Section: Focus
Ten-year-old Tom Sawyer was sitting in his room playing video games when suddenly the entire house started trembling. Sawyer, now a Hillsdale College junior, knew there was only one possible explanation - earthquake!
"I just thought, 'Dude, that's weird, the walls are shaking,'" Sawyer said. "Then it reset my Nintendo and erased my 'Zelda' file."
Sawyer is not the only Hillsdale student from California who has experienced an earthquake. Junior Erin Larson said she experienced the largest earthquake she can remember in 15 years at her home in Newport Beach this summer. Larson has felt about four to five minor earthquakes in the past year.
"Tornado warnings here [in Michigan] are like earthquakes there," Larson said.
Her most recent experience lasted about a minute, not even enough time for her to brace herself inside a doorframe as experts suggest.
Most earthquakes are so localized some students have lived on the West Coast for years and barely felt a tremor.
"The only time I've ever felt an earthquake was when I left the country and went to Tonga, and I've lived in California for about seven years," senior Naomi Johnson said.
As a homeowner, Erin Larson's father Kenneth Larson said he has not felt the need to take too many precautions in "earthquake-proofing" his home. Such measures are expensive, and though earthquakes are alarming while they are happening, Kenneth said severe earthquakes are too rare to concern most homeowners.
"There are a number of houses that have been around since the turn of the century, and some stuff that wasn't even built on foundations in the '30s is still standing," Kenneth said. "Others with the most modern structural analysis lay over like playing cards. Go figure."
Though many quakes register as tremors, they are at times severe and, in some cases, deadly.
The earthquake Larson recalls from 15 years ago was the devastating 1994 Northridge Earthquake. It registered 6.7 on the Richter scale and left more than 60 people dead.
"They're expecting another rather large one soon, as in sometime this year," Larson said.
However, Larson's father added in an e-mail that most earthquakes merely set off alarms and break dishes. As such, he said, earthquakes are often much less extensive in destructive power than a tornado or a flood in the Midwest.
"It is my opinion that these kinds of natural events are a way of God getting in touch with us and reminding us who's in control," Kenneth said. "Why he lets Californians off so easily is beyond my understanding."
"I just thought, 'Dude, that's weird, the walls are shaking,'" Sawyer said. "Then it reset my Nintendo and erased my 'Zelda' file."
Sawyer is not the only Hillsdale student from California who has experienced an earthquake. Junior Erin Larson said she experienced the largest earthquake she can remember in 15 years at her home in Newport Beach this summer. Larson has felt about four to five minor earthquakes in the past year.
"Tornado warnings here [in Michigan] are like earthquakes there," Larson said.
Her most recent experience lasted about a minute, not even enough time for her to brace herself inside a doorframe as experts suggest.
Most earthquakes are so localized some students have lived on the West Coast for years and barely felt a tremor.
"The only time I've ever felt an earthquake was when I left the country and went to Tonga, and I've lived in California for about seven years," senior Naomi Johnson said.
As a homeowner, Erin Larson's father Kenneth Larson said he has not felt the need to take too many precautions in "earthquake-proofing" his home. Such measures are expensive, and though earthquakes are alarming while they are happening, Kenneth said severe earthquakes are too rare to concern most homeowners.
"There are a number of houses that have been around since the turn of the century, and some stuff that wasn't even built on foundations in the '30s is still standing," Kenneth said. "Others with the most modern structural analysis lay over like playing cards. Go figure."
Though many quakes register as tremors, they are at times severe and, in some cases, deadly.
The earthquake Larson recalls from 15 years ago was the devastating 1994 Northridge Earthquake. It registered 6.7 on the Richter scale and left more than 60 people dead.
"They're expecting another rather large one soon, as in sometime this year," Larson said.
However, Larson's father added in an e-mail that most earthquakes merely set off alarms and break dishes. As such, he said, earthquakes are often much less extensive in destructive power than a tornado or a flood in the Midwest.
"It is my opinion that these kinds of natural events are a way of God getting in touch with us and reminding us who's in control," Kenneth said. "Why he lets Californians off so easily is beyond my understanding."
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