I thought it's been proved fairly recently that strange animal behavior may at times be found prior to an earthquake because of the release of a certain chemical or gas (don't remember which) which accompanies the sort of big geological movements that precede an earthquake. The next step is developing some sort of satellite-based technology to detect the release of said chemical or gas, rather than relying on animals. I am probably remembering this wrong, but this came out around the big earthquake in China. Do we have earthquake scientists among us? Or at least someone who wants to google a bit? Am too lazy right now.

Da Bing

That might be the case, but even defining what would be considered 'Reliable' to the public doesn't really matter anyway. Would the authorities tell anyone of their suspicions that a there was a 60% chance of a 7+ earthquake within a 200 mile by 10 mile fault area in the next 5 weeks be an acceptable criteria . Where does the threshold lie before informing the Public of the potential threat? esp when you have organisations such as the USGS publically stating categorically that Earthquakes cannot be predicted with any degree of accuracy (but still have yet to define the accuracy threshold)

What is the point of the USGS's work on Earthquake monitoring if this is the case. Their work should have been wound up years ago.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6wXT0IELww @9:18

Well not to poke holes, but the American press loves to spout ridiculous statements exactly like that. According to them Washington State is under constant scare of Mt. Rainer exploding and at any moment varying parts of California will be destroyed by an earthquake. Oh and some stupid Plant X, Nirhiu(?) event is happening. All my loony Facebook friends are posting stuff on that.

Yup. I was 5.8? I sleep through those. OK, really, it's a decent size.

I feel bad for my wife. She's from Wisconsin, I'm a Cali boy. She's never felt one. We live in VA, maybe 80 miles from the epicenter. Of course, she's out of the country right now.

Oh, public service announcement: Don't go running into the streets people. That's just going to get you hit by cars. From experience, I can tell you a 6.2 isn't always felt when you're driving. I bet almost everyone in a car yesterday didn't know it was happening, and if you run in front of them, they're not expecting it.

Glad to hear everyone is ok.

Agreed, very interesting to feel the earth move. Really puts a perspective on just how much energy is in an earthquake. Clearly felt it here in Alexandria, VA.

Bill

Honestly if I had been in the VA quake I might have resisted the WA instinct to duck cover and hold, and simply bend over and kiss my arse goodbye, expecting a blast wave to follow.

I first heard about the quake from a TV in a hallway, CNN said it was centered 85 miles SW of DC and I automatically thought oh boy, there's are nuclear reactors right about there, maybe something catastrophic happened.

Its interesting to me that both of my initial reactions had nothing to do with earthquakes - I think more often of the DC area as a strategic target area for enemies of the US. Didn't realize it also had serious EQs.

Best thread of the event goes on over on zombiehunters.org, where wags have already rationalized the cause of the EQ as the lizard people, specifically an angry attempt to surface after an offer to feed Congress to the lizard queen was rebuffed. Love it.

The local media is reporting (with 20/20 hindsight) that some of the animals at the National Zoo did react with alarm/alert types of behaviors and vocalizations prior to the earthquake.

Pete

Lono -- you are spot-on. No one I've talked to here has said their initial thought was that it was an earthquake. Most said their first instinct was that there had been a construction accident near or at wherever they were at the time.

The next thought was that there had been a terrorist attack. That's the one that was in my mind when I hustled outside. It was out there that I heard speculation of an earthquake and checked the USGS website.

My first thought on the earthquake possibility was that there had been a catastrophic New Madrid quake and like 1811-1812, it was "ringing bells" back east. When I saw on the USGS site that it was Virginia, my geology geekdom kicked in. I'd previously read everything I could find on Virginia/Mid-Atlantic seismicity.

People in cars had a variety of reactions. One friend was on the 14th Street Bridge and did not notice anything. Another was driving in Bethesda and thought something was terribly wrong with his car and put the transmission in neutral thinking that was the problem.

This degree of shaking in DC has not happened in anyone's lifetime so yesterday's quake lacked context for most of us. I grew up in Los Angeles and remember the '71 Sylmar quake (6.5 magnitude) but that happened at 6:00a and woke us up.

9/11 was my context for this event so thoughts went to attack -- massive bomb explosion. Really, on my way outside my mind was processing how large a bomb(s) would be to cause the earth to move in that way and for such a period of time.

Was relieved to discover it was an earthquake.

While not as good for many things as a dedicated folder or fixed-blade knife, I can get a multitool many places where a knife isn't welcome.