Earthquake..... a really big one!

Well... last night I was relaxing in a nice hot bath, enjoying a fine glass of Zinfandel and reading a mystery novel (the novel wasn't that great but that's ok). I was zoned right out in my little spa environment when all of a sudden the bath water started to slosh back and forth in the tub (twice it went right over the edge of the bathtub) and I felt like I was out on a rough lake in a canoe.I was lightheaded, dizzy and slightly nauseated; just like being sea sick. I would take a guess that this sloshing of water lasted about 50 seconds.

 Now, one would think a person would jump right out of the tub and go "What the hell just happened?" but no, I was apparently thought the wine had elicited some sort of hallucinatory effect so my first reaction was to put the wine glass on the floor and cease drinking it immediately. I read a few more pages and then got out of the tub.

A few minutes later I showed up in the living room to find Bob and the kids there and they peppered me with questions "Didn't you feel that?", "It's all over Facebook", "We had an earthquake", "Weren't you scared?". They filled me in on all the things they had seen and felt. The blinds on the living room window were shaking back and forth like crazy, the house felt like it was moving, the hanging lights were moving back and forth etc. I've since found a few things that fell over; books and pictures. The kids were quite excited over the whole thing but unnerved and a bit scared at the same time.

Bob said he felt like he was going to pass out because he wasn't moving but everything around him was; I felt like I had vertigo and that continued on through the evening with the aftershocks. Although there was no shaking that I could feel you would just get little waves of "unsteadiness".. it was all very odd. I can only imagine what it felt like on Haida Gwaii and I am so thankful that nobody was hurt and there appears to be nothing major in terms of damage (at least nothing reported to this point).

If nothing else, this a huge wake up call. The magnitude was 7.7; that is a massive earthquake and had it been centered in a populated area there would have been casualties and major damage. I guess we should all pay attention; we live a fair ways inland and felt it strong enough to do what it did here..next time we might not be so lucky.


Have a good one!