# Bay Area Dopers, check in please
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [May 14, 2002, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974 "2002-05-14T05:05:53Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@DPWhite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPWhite)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/21 "2002-05-14T05:50:01Z")
Everyone in the Bay Area is mostly likely fine, I am. 5.3 in the area is once every couple of years. Due to the building codes here, we are quite safe up to the mid 6 range.
Both my grandmas were in the 06 quake (7.9). One had a the house collapse around the family which was bundled up in a bed. Something of a famous photo resulted. The other had to live in the park for a while.
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### Author:  [@reprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/reprise)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/22 "2002-05-14T05:53:07Z")
22:00:29 PDT, 3 miles SW of Gilroy according to the [USGS](http://pasadena.wr.usgs.gov/shake/ca).
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### Author:  [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/23 "2002-05-14T07:05:48Z")
Yeah, 5.2 is definitely no big deal. And nobody lives up there anyway.
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### Author:  [@White\_Lightning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/White_Lightning)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/24 "2002-05-14T07:11:35Z")
Or down there. Whatever.
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### Author:  [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 8:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/25 "2002-05-14T08:12:51Z")
Kinda fun, really. I like the little ones - It’s like the “magic fingers” in a particularly cheap motel. 😛
- Tamerlane
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### Author:  [@LolaBaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LolaBaby)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/26 "2002-05-14T08:14:40Z")
I just heard about it, I hope everyone is alright.
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### Author:  [@voguevixen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/voguevixen)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/27 "2002-05-14T14:56:42Z")
Forget me…is the GARLIC ok!!!
(Yeah, not that big a deal where we were, a bit north of SJ…sort of on the “wheeee” level.)
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### Author:  [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/28 "2002-05-14T16:27:53Z")
My wife’s an earthquake newbie and was lying in bed. I was in the bathroom brushing my teeth, felt a little bump and didn’t give it a second though–that is, not until she came running with this panicked look in her eyes. She was up for the next hour going through the news channels wanting some confirmation that it was serious enough to justify her response. Very cute (although it was hard not to laugh when the various live anchors would say “Well, we didn’t feel anything here”).
5.2’s a decent size; glad to see the injuries and damage were pretty minor compared to the Napa one of the same size a year or two ago (that one _really_ freaked her out; I was in Europe at the time, though I was here for Loma Prieta but she wasn’t).
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### Author:  [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/29 "2002-05-14T16:47:01Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by voguevixen \*
> \*\*Forget me…is the GARLIC ok!!!
> \*\*
I think all the garlic fell off the garlic trees.
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### Author:  [@Sassy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sassy)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/30 "2002-05-14T17:11:08Z")
It was a good shake here in the heart of SF - and my building is on bedrock. 5.2 is enough that there may be some small damage near the epicenter, but for most of us it’s just the fault lines saying “what’s up?”
😛
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### Author:  [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/31 "2002-05-14T17:14:21Z")
I was at the computer, with my foot on the wall. Soon-to-be Mrs. Giraffe was just sliding the closet door shut when I felt the wall vibrating. My first thought was “Damn! She really slammed that closet door! The whole building is shaking!” Then I realized it was an earthquake, waited a second to see if it was going to get a lot stronger, then went back to what I was doing.
Soon-to-be Mrs. Giraffe ran to the doorway, where she stood looking excited and exclaiming that I should join her there. She’s from the Midwest. This same woman watched TV five feet from a sliding glass door throughout my first tornado warning, when a twister was headed right for town. I crouched next to the bathtub and yelled at her.
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### Author:  [@Sue\_Duhnym](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sue_Duhnym)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/32 "2002-05-14T18:15:21Z")
I was at the Sharks game and didn’t feel a thing. The paper today said that the scoreboard was swinging and I didn’t notice that either.
AFAIK, there was one house fire from a tipped over water heater and that’s about it for damage.
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### Author:  [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/33 "2002-05-14T18:26:44Z")
I’m here too. I felt it, and the boys came running out of their rooms asking if I felt it. The funniest was the wife who freaked (and she’s a native Oaklander). Most of my building emptied out. Of course we live on top of the Hayward fault so we feel the smalls one quite easy. We all had a good laugh and were quieted down within 15 minutes.
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### Author:  [@islandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/islandgirl)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/34 "2002-05-14T18:40:40Z")
It was a nice 5 seconds or so of shakes.
I was at a friend’s house…they were trying to dive under the kitchen table while I finished watching a movie on a TV that was threatening to fall off the entertainment unit.
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### Author:  [@Great\_Dave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Dave)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/35 "2002-05-14T21:13:04Z")
Nice little shaker last night. Figured it was a ways from Alameda due to the time difference between the two waves. I heard the same report as Sue- one house burned due to leaky gas line.
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### Author:  [@happyheathen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/happyheathen)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/36 "2002-05-14T22:13:45Z")
Please save the panic for those which register at least 6.5 (roughly 12x a 5.2)
Now to get nailed for:
a) refering to the Richter scale, which _EVERYONE_ knows is horrible obsolete and meaningless
b) Getting the damned logarithm wrong
p.s. the heathen is fine, thank you
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### Author:  [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/37 "2002-05-14T22:36:47Z")
I’m fine, i thought a fat dude was running on my roof until there was more shaking than Jabba the Hutt could have done. But now i’m an earthquake survivor, where’s my T-shirt?
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### Author:  [@Jack\_Batty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jack_Batty)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/38 "2002-05-14T23:11:04Z")
Damn, I miss San Francisco.
I think I give off anti-quake aura or something. I was out there for three years – nothing. As soon as I move back to Maine - 5.2.
Go figure.
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### Author:  [@reprise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/reprise)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/39 "2002-05-14T23:12:00Z")
**heathen** , all the government sites I checked yesterday used the Richter scale (and I was sent to the real time sites by geologists), so it’s clearly still in widespread use.
To those of us in non-quake prone countries, 5.2 - while technically “moderate” - has the capacity to inflict substantial damage because our buildings aren’t purpose-built to cope with such geological events as they are in SF.
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### Author:  [@mlerose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mlerose)
#### Post date: [May 14, 2002, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bay-area-dopers-check-in-please/108974/40 "2002-05-14T23:39:29Z")
Was landing in a jet plane at the time…didn’t feel it. My roommate, who picked me up, did. She was in Berkeley at a cafe and saw the glass window wobble a bit.
Thanks for your concern, though.
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