May 2015 MICHIGAN Traverse City 3 - Quick Quake Note

While we were in Traverse City on May 2, we got several texts and calls from friends (some from California) who wondered if we were OK after the earthquake. We had no idea what they were talking about. We haven't lived in San Francisco (earthquake country) for 12 years, so we were confused.

It turns out while we were on vaca there was a significant earthquake in Kalamazoo at 12:23pm on Saturday. We did not feel a thing in T.C., but we were seriously motoring down the wine trail at that moment.

Here's what our upstairs neighbor said -- We definitely felt the earthquake and also heard a really really really loud noise. It sounded like something had crashed into the roof or a vehicle had run into the building. We heard this same description from a number of friends.

We worried about Bella, but our downstairs neighbor texted that she checked the building (even our rickety basement) and could see no damage. When we got home, we did not see any change other than a few knick-knacks in the China cabinet looked slightly out of place.

Later we read that in terms of magnitude, it was 4.2 on the Richter scale. It was among 18 earthquakes in the world that day with a 4.0+ reading. The epicenter was in Scotts, Michigan, about 12 miles away from home. No deaths or major injuries reported.

By Tuesday after the quake 13,656 people in 1,156 zip codes had offered first hand accounts of their experience on a U.S. Geological Survey website questionnaire. Our Ohio relatives did not feel anything though.

Quakes are quite rare in Michigan. The last significant one occurred in 1947 centered near Coldwater, Michigan. The news said after some investigation experts felt this particular event had nothing to do with fracking. Instead scientists surmise that a new fault between Coldwater and Kalamazoo has been discovered and caused the quake. It probably involved a strike-slip fault, a vertical fracture where the blocks move horizontally.

We thought we left all this behind in San Francisco. We lived through a number of quakes there. 1989 was the big one at 6.9 on the San Andreas fault. That occurred during a World Series baseball playoff game at Candlestick Park. Part of the upper level of the Bay Bridge roadway collapsed on the lower level. All in all there were 63 deaths and 3,757 injuries. Now that was a big one.  Mike and I were both working at the airport. In our respective workplaces we felt if quite strongly and it even closed the airport down.