What if these are Preshocks, not Aftershocks ?

     


   My husband and I go relatively long periods without having the chance to go out to lunch or dinner together.  Between his job in the city, and all the things I do, including things with our kids, dinner at home is usually all we can fit in.   In the past couple of weeks though, we had the opportunity to eat out together twice.  The first time was the casual dinner in which I broke my molar, and the second one was yesterday, when we went shopping for some things to do some home maintenance, and decided to go out for lunch at a new Chinese restaurant.   Once again, I was in a Chinese restaurant when an earthquake hit.  This was a minor one, a 2.6, and the glasses in the restaurant shook, as did the lighting fixtures and the fine square white dishes on the marble topped tables.  We had two such quakes this weekend.   Since the major one in August, most people ignore these, simply considering them aftershocks.
           I am not at all sure that these are simple aftershocks. There have been more than a hundred of them since August. It seems to me that perhaps this is an indication that a newer or less known fault is active now, and that additional more severe quakes are coming, perhaps not only to Virginia, but to the East Coast as well.  This might explain all the minivans from the US Geological Survey here, placing more listening devices, and perhaps for the initial reluctance to give federal monies for clean up.  Perhaps these clusters of quakes are in fact, pre-shocks of a more severe quake that is coming soon. What if a more severe quake is coming ?  Would we be told ?
           It seems reasonably simple to prepare for future quakes.  Anchor bookcases, refrigerators, storage units, etc.   Place magnet closures on kitchen cabinets.  Consider placing shelf bracing across shelves to prevent the shooting out of jars during a quake.

Shelf with bracing, This picture is borrowed from the Blog: The Prepared LDS Family. (Links to her blog are at the end of this page)

                                            

          Look at each of your bedrooms and sleeping areas.  If an earthquake were to occur, would books, glassware or decorative items fall on the heads of sleepers ?  Take a serious look around your home and see what you think could stand to be fortified, changed or reinforced.   This need not cost much.  I spent $75.00 a couple of years ago in order to anchor things securely at our house, and for the most part, we anticipated well. (Other than our main pantry.  The door was unlatched and things were literally thrown across the room when the earthquake occurred.) We will now make sure it is latched before leaving.  We can't anticipate everything, but we can anticipate a great deal.