Sinfest

[Darqcyde]

[Darqcyde]

Also if the Ramapo Fault on the East Coast were to cause a bad enough quake not only would east coast metropolises be devastated but the U.S. might even get it's own Fukushima. Granted it won't be exactly the same but yeah it'll be hurty.

Also: U.S. Bridges are in really, really bad shape in general. I'm curious as to how the quake affected the ratings of the bridges since so many were already so close to being condemned.
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[Lemontree]

Yeah seriously.. there's a bridge here in Richmond that's looked like a patchwork quilt for years and they've only JUST started work on rebuilding it that's not expected to be complete til 2013.. after Tuesday's quake, it's my mission not to drive across that bridge from now on unless absolutely necessary. But in general, that's a problem in the state of Virginia. The past governor tried making it a priority to find transportation funding to help work on some of that during his term.. and after not being too successful, he made sure to rail on about it during his going away yearly speech. The new governor seems to have been able to finally get some projects underway, but I haven't really paid attention to where the money's been coming from.

Bridges have made me nervous though, ever since seeing the dumb movie "Mothman Prophecies".

[E-boy]

So, someone made a comment that a 6.1 caused a lot more damage somewhere else than a 5.8 did here... The main reply involved differences in building codes, and that almost certainly played a role, but it's worth noting that the richter scale is logarithmic. a 6.1 is roughly 10 time more powerful than a 5.1. So, a 6.1 is roughly three times stronger than a 5.8. A 300% increase in shaking strength can translate to a lot of additional damage.
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"Life is tough, but it's tougher when you're stupid" ~ SGT John Stryker from "Sands of Iwo Jima".

[Sam the Eagle]

If the Richter scale was the only way to measure earthquake's effects, then your point would be valid.

Wiki explaining technical stuff. Summing up, Richter scale doesn't translate into the same effect in two different places so comparing 'scale for scale' doesn't make sense in the end. Please look up the seismic intensity chapter of the Kobe earthquake to see what I mean.

That is the reason why Japan doesn't use the Richter scale but the Shindo one. Both 6.1 and 5.8 are about 4 in Shindo scale, one being 4+ the other 4-. The difference isn't enough to justify buildings collapsing and a death toll that large. Even after taking into account the way earth shakes, a mag 4 should be nothing if constructions norms are serious.

I've been through a lot of them. You feel them of course, then that's it. That doesn't mean a mag 4 is something to be laughed at; that's what mag 3 earthquakes are for.

5 is another matter.



Add, since when Thy made sense?.
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[Drui]

Here in Jersey, in the rocky town where I work, we didn't feel a thing. But I still thought it was pretty remarkable, given that Jersey is the most boring place in the world when it comes to natural disasters. Especially considering the week before the earthquake, we had tornadoes, and the week after we had a hurricane. Individually, these things qualify as surprising and interesting. In such rapid succession... Somewhat alarming.
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