Students react to 7.1 weekend quake
From staff and AP reports
Although the recent 7.1 earthquake ripped
a nearly 25-mile-long gash across the surface of the Mojave Desert on Saturday,
no damage was reported at Cal State Long Beach, said Rick Gloady CSULB
spokesman.
Gloady said university officials made a
quick inspection of the campus Sunday morning. A more thorough inspection
was made Monday morning and no significant damage was found.
However, the nerves of some CSULB students
were definitely rattled.
"The whole apartment building [in Long
Beach] was moving for about five to 10 seconds," said Mandel Vidal, a junior
majoring in civil engineering. "I woke up and ran underneath the doorway.
I was a little bit scared."
But the earthquake did not surprise other
students in the area.
"Water came out of my swimming pool and
came down the driveway," said Jacque Mitchell, a graduate student. "I could
tell it was not that bad. I lived in the same house during the Northridge
earthquake."
Some students, such as junior Jaime Martinez,
did not feel anything Saturday morning.
"Nothing woke me up," Martinez said. "I
did not know we had an earthquake until 7 p.m. when someone told me."
The 2:46 a.m. quake on the Lavic Lake
fault, which seismologists thought was inactive, was upgraded after a review
of seismic data recorded worldwide.
The increase in magnitude represents about
25 percent more ground motion, U.S. Geological Survey seismologist Lucy
Jones said at a press conference at the California Institute of Technology.
The temblor on the vast Marine Corps Air
Ground Combat Center near the remote town of Ludlow caused a passenger
train derailment but only minor injuries and light damage. Scientists have
dubbed it the Hector Mine Earthquake, after a local landmark.
Preliminary analysis indicated the quake
occurred in a region where stress was increased by the magnitude-7.3 Landers
earthquake seve years ago.
"It's clear that the faults in this area
are talking to each other,'' Jones said.
The Landers quake struck in the desert
on June 28, 1992, and was followed within hours by a 6.5 jolt near Big
Bear Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains. The Landers quake killed a boy,
and both quakes caused 400 injuries and $100 million in damage.
Saturday's quake is not considered an
aftershock of Landers but scientists will be exploring the relationship,
the USGS said.
The biggest offset measured along the
rupture was 12 1/2 feet to 15 1/2 feet. An offset is the distance a point
on one side moved relative to where it had been touching the other side
before the rupture. Stream beds or roads typically show offsets dramatically.
No damage was reported from the hundreds
of aftershocks -- including three of magnitude 5.0 or greater -- that continued
to rock the region. |
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