A late Scatterday Entrant for Terrifying E.

Lindi mentioned earthquakes in her Blog entry for E and that woke up my brain cells and brought some memories.

While we were living in Seattle, there was a 6.8 Earthquake. I was at home in our apartment in Issaquah when it happened. There was a loud rumbling noise like a heavy truck passing and the whole front of the apartment building shook from side to side.

Gordon was at work at a Boeing facility in Kent which is south of Seattle and closer to the earthquake's epicentre. His building suffered quite some damage even though it was built to survive earthquakes. It was built on teflon blocks so it could slide with the vibrations. And slide it did, but the water tanks (for firefighting) in the roof couldn't keep up with the sliding and the tanks ruptured.

Water gushed through the ceiling, panels came crashing down and over it all there was the rumble, rumble, rumble of the earthquake. Suddenly was silence and everyone waited . Then the air was filled with 100+ car alarms going off.

We were lucky that day as the epicentre was deep underground.

Sometime later we found that just near where we lived in Issaquah is a fault line.

After the earthquake, friends back in Australia asked Gordon if he thought perhaps we should come home. His reply,"Heck, no! There's a sleeping volcano just down the road." ( Mt Rainer and Mt StHelens are in Washington State). Ever the adventure seeker is my Husband.

Footnote: The Rattle in Seattle did give Gordon a little unexpected holiday. Repairs to his building took 3 weeks and it was closed during that time.

This building was at Renton (another Boeing facility) was so badly damaged in the earthquake that it was never again safe and it was eventually demolished.