HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: karn@chicago.qualcomm.com (Phil Karn)
Subject: Re: Personal Tales of Big Earthquakes
Organization: Qualcomm, Inc
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 16:16:46 GMT

In article <1992Aug14.171906.18262@netlabs.com> lwall@netlabs.com (Larry Wall) writes:
>[Er, uh, you'd think that Mr. Richter would know that the material often
>*doesn't* remain intact...]

Sorry about that. I meant to add that these wave observations have
often been made in material that is completely intact after the
earthquake.  Even many highly trained people have been fooled by this
illusion; Richter quotes a scientist at Pasadena who saw 4-6 inch
"waves" in a solid concrete floor during the San Jacinto earthquake of
1918, yet in an inspection immediately afterwards he (the scientist)
could not find even the slightest crack.

Richter describes this phenomenon as an "unsolved mystery" and
advances several physical mechanisms for the illusion, including the
changes in refractive index near the surface due to the pressure waves
from the earthquake. He also mentioned psychological factors, but given
his specialty he didn't go into them very far.

He did simply mention inner-ear upsets, which I think is a reasonable
theory. I would also consider also the process of human vision.
Although you seem to have a full picture of the world in front of you,
at any instant your eyes are really seeing in high resolution only
that small spot at which you're directly looking.  Constant movement
of your eyes builds up an image in your brain which you think of as
complete and real time; liken it to a frame buffer that is being
randomly updated.  But you "think" you're seeing everything in front
of you continuously. Magicians exploit this all the time.

Combine this mechanism of vision with the accelertions of the inner
ear during an earthquake and I could easily expect to see all sorts of
things happening that really aren't. During Landers it seemed here
that the house was tilting and rolling quite a bit. It wasn't
until after the quake was over that I was surprised to find that many
items I would have expected to be knocked over by motion of that
magnitude were not. Then I knew that I must have greatly overestimated
the motions, probably due to this eye/inner ear interaction.

Humans are lousy accelerometers. I guess both seismologists and pilots
learn this.

Phil
From: eugene@wilbur.nas.nasa.gov (Eugene N. Miya)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Running out of the building
Date: 18 Aug 92 20:36:33 GMT
Distribution: ca
Organization: NAS, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA

In article <64219@cup.portal.com> Harv@cup.portal.com (Harv R Laser) writes:
>We're also imprinted with images 

You didn't get imprinted with "Drop" drills?  8^)

>I know that after the '33 Long Beach quake the codes in Calif. were
>radically upgraded. 

The irony will come if and when the North Mudd building at Caltech
collapses.  This pre-1933 building was one of the sites of Richter's
research.  It will probably be highly photographed after it does
(followed by Agassiz's head in the ground statue at Stanford [1906])
I just hope my friends who have NM offices and labs aren't in it when it goes.

>Was it built to American construction standards or is the
>the situation in the Philippines similar to what it is in Russia,
>where the codes are lax or nonexistant? 

American?  Try Californian.

--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eugene@orville.nas.nasa.gov
  Resident Cynic, Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers
  {uunet,mailrus,other gateways}!ames!eugene
Second Favorite email message: Returned mail: Cannot send message for 3 days
A Ref: Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning, vol. 1, G. Polya
From: casey@well.sf.ca.us (Kathleen Creighton)
Subject: Running out of the building
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link
Distribution: ca
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 01:17:45 GMT


You know, it has been my observation that the *first* thing people are going
to do is "leave the building".  That's what I did.  That's what my
neighbors did.  That's what everyone's who's posted here did.  And from
hearing their stories, that's what people in SoCal did, too.  We didn't
know this until we experienced it ourselves, but wanting *out* of the
building seems like a natural response.

So in a moment of high panic, adrenalin pumping, it seems to me that "stay
in the building" denies outright the fact that most people want to *leave*.
Wouldn't it make more sense to tell people to have a sense of their
surroundings (that's what I did in my apartment when the earthquake
started--I glanced around where I was sitting to make sure nothing on the
wall was going to come at me) and to proceed only if they perceive those
surroundings to be safe?  Running out to the middle of a parking lot in
most cases doesn't strike me as a bad idea, but you wouldn't want to be
standing within reach of a stanchion, right?  Or power lines.  Or, as in
the case of downtown San Francisco, on the sidewalk under those buildings,
especially the older ones.  In fact, the people who walked up to the
Upper Market area from downtown came up the *middle* of Market Street.

What do you think?
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
From: goodrich@qdeck.com (Steve Goodrich)
Subject: Re: Power LInes
Organization: Quarterdeck Office Systems
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 14:30:41 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.142746.533@spacm1.spac.spc.com> iccsap020@spacm1.spac.spc.com (David Cohen) writes:
>I have an earthquake pamphlet that says that if a power line falls on
>your car during a quake, not to worry.  You are safe in your car.
>What it doesn't say is when, if ever, you can get out of your car.
>Does anyone know?

Yes.  You get out when the power company *COMES TO YOU* and tells you that 
it is safe to get out.  Not before.  My dad works for a power company, and
he has lots of stories and memories to relate about power lines falling on 
the big power-line rigs (the trucks with the drills and toolboxes) and 
blowing all six tires.  Those boys didn't get out until someone came to 
get them out.  And there's always the story of the "downed" powerline 
on a rainy night that fell across a road.  A policeman came along and 
draped a red cloth across it to warn drivers.  Had that powerline been
active, the town would have had one less hero.  I guess the moral of these
stories is:  Don't take chances... go ahead and let the 16Kv-260Kv course
through the metal of your car... it's much less painful to buy a new car
than it is to pay for a funeral.

Steve G.
goodrich@qdeck.com
From: art@acc.com (Art Berggreen)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Questions raised by SoCal Activity
Keywords: usgs refs, landers
Date: 18 Aug 92 17:10:06 GMT
Organization: ACC, Advanced Computer Communications

In article <1992Aug17.222357.23416@nas.nasa.gov> eugene@wilbur.nas.nasa.gov (Eugene N. Miya) writes:
>Others:  Death Valley in particular is C.B. Hunt's book on Death Valley,
>named "Death Valley."
>
>Bob Sharp's K/H Series of geology field guide (pink cover) and that yellow
>covered guide (I forget the author).  Far better to see some of this stuff
>in the field.

The Death Valley area is definitely a wonderful place to visit (at the
right time of year) with someone who knows the geology.  A friend of mine
teaches geology and they make field trips out there every spring.  There
is little vegatation to hide the geology and many vantage points which
offer panoramic views of the area.  

Art
From: iccsap020@spacm1.spac.spc.com (David Cohen)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Power LInes
Date: 18 Aug 92 14:27:45 PDT
Organization: Security Pacific Automation Co., LA, CA

I have an earthquake pamphlet that says that if a power line falls on
your car during a quake, not to worry.  You are safe in your car.
What it doesn't say is when, if ever, you can get out of your car.
Does anyone know?
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
From: jta@kilroy.Jpl.Nasa.Gov (Jon T. Adams (336))
Subject: Shaking Buildings w/o Earthquakes
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Distribution: ca
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 16:43:53 GMT

>|>    They should've studied Nicola Tesla's papers.  He succeeded in
>|>    creating a few artificial earthquakes in lower Manhattan by
>|>    smiting the ground (with a piling hammer) at it's resonant
>|>    frequency.   
>

I have heard the legend (or is it reality?  At Cal Tech, you never know) of 
the widget atop the library building that induced tremendous shaking into
the building just by hanging a small weight at the end of an arm rotating
in the horizontal plane, and adjusting the rotation rate until BINGO! the
resonant frequency of the building was found...

Speaking of coupling external energy to the Earth, what about the little
wiggles on the seismometers when the Shuttle drops back through the atmosphere?
I have always been led to believe that was due to the atmospheric shock wave
pushing against large buildings in downtown LA, and those buildings coupling
that energy to the ground.

And on the note of folks nearly always wanting to run OUT of the building
during the quake:  I guess that I've only done that once, and I realize now 
that I'm terribly ashamed of that action and have obviously been suppressing
that memory for some time.  God, what a relief to get it off my mind...  But
I also remember it was due partially to a herd instinct (I was with nervous
people who ran first, I swear they did!), and it was in Building 238 at JPL,
which is also used as an unofficial seismometer at the Lab (we measure the 
lengths of the cracks in the wall after the quake, and estimate the shock).
Actually, the building is anchored in the foothill only at the rear of the 9
floor structure (square footprint).  The front of the building is cantilevered 
out about 20 feet and held up with some wimpy square pylons.  The whole 
building does a brisk shimmy along the Z-axis when the shock rolls by...  

Anyway, I'm always fascinated by the goings-on inside a building during 
a quake.  I slept through Landers but was awake by the time Big Bear 
hit.  Then the hanging lamp swayed back and forth and the venusian blinds 
rattled quite a bit.  Whittier Narrows I was on the freeway in a car with 
crummy suspension so I never noticed it.  The only really good quake I can 
remember was Sylmar 1971, when I was standing in the hallway at home getting 
ready for school and the hallway moved back and forth while I madly 
compensated.  The technical term for this is The Rubber Hallway effect,
first described by Nicolas Tesla, during his first experiments at long
distance communication using waves.  He hadn't quite gotten to electromagnetic
waves yet...

- jon
From: lwall@netlabs.com (Larry Wall)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Power LInes
Date: 19 Aug 92 19:02:51 GMT
Organization: NetLabs, Inc.

In article <51096@seismo.CSS.GOV> stead@skadi.CSS.GOV (Richard Stead) writes:
: Thus, it is floating well above electrical ground.  You are floating as well.

60 times a second this is untrue, unless you happen to have discovered
a DC intertie.  You probably haven't.

: If you attempt to leave, even by jumping, the entire current of the cable
: will follow your body to the ground.

Oh, nonsense.  The main reason to discourage jumping is because Persons
of Indeterminate Competence will screw it up and touch both the car and
the ground, or jump into a soggy patch that happens to have a wire
across it.  The amount of charge your body can store can give you a
bit of a static shock when you land, but if 4 inches of air is good enough
between your tire rims and the ground, it's pretty certain that 4 feet
of air will be good enough between you and the car.

The idea that the current will follow you implies that you'll create
and maintain a path of ionized air between you and the car.  I doubt you
have enough innate capacitance for that without the help of the ground.

Certainly, in the absence of other considerations, you should stay in
the car.  The car conducts electricity much better than you do.  Let it.

(This is why you stay in your car during an electrical storm.  NOT because
the tires are going to stop a potential that just crossed a mile or two
of air, but because if the car is hit, you won't notice (much) because
you're in (somewhat of) a Faraday cage.  Keep your hands inside, Sally.)

But enough of bolts and dolts.  Back to wires and tires.  If that 4 inches
of tire WASN'T enough because of, say, an unfortunately placed cosmic ray
or blade of wet grass, your car could be attempting to emulate a pyre.
Jump competently when you have to.

Larry Wall
lwall@netlabs.com

P.S.  Hint.  With a manual transmission you can move a car a little
ways even if you can't start the engine, as long as the battery and
starter still work.  Just remember what happened the last time you
tried to start your car in gear...
From: billd@informix.com (William Daul)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Running out of the building
Date: 18 Aug 92 22:16:50 GMT
Distribution: ca
Organization: Informix Software, Inc.

I have been taught that if a building collapes you should assume it will
fall away a third of its height.

--Bill
-- 
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 William Daul             Advanced Support      INFORMIX SOFTWARE INC.
 4100 Bohannon Dr.        (415) 926-6488 - wk
 Menlo Park, CA. 94025    uunet!infmx!billd  or  billd@informix.com
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
From: jc@optimla.aimla.com (John VanHoozer)
Subject: Re: Nostradamus & Earthquake Prediction
Reply-To: jc@optimla.aimla.com (John VanHoozer)
Organization: OptImage Interactive Services Co., L.P.
Distribution: ca
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 92 14:28:21 GMT

In article <183055@pyramid.pyramid.com>, lstowell@pyrnova.mis.pyramid.com 
(Lon Stowell) writes:
|> In article <22194@venera.isi.edu> tar@isi.edu writes:
|> >
|> >"From the WASHINGTON TIMES: 'Four large people tried to make
|> >16th-century astrologer Nostradamus's [sic] prediction of an
|> >earthquake this month come true, courtesy of a Phoenix radio station.
|> 
|>    They should've studied Nicola Tesla's papers.  He succeeded in
|>    creating a few artificial earthquakes in lower Manhattan by
|>    smiting the ground (with a piling hammer) at it's resonant
|>    frequency.   


That's interesting.  I remember reading an article (not very factual) 
about Tesla about 10 years ago.  I was under the impression
that he claimed to have been responsible but refused to explain how
he had done it.

Can anyone _really_ believe this?

				jc

-- 
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Carpe Diem:  A carp a day, that's all we ask.
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
From: eugene@wilbur.nas.nasa.gov (Eugene N. Miya)
Subject: Re: Questions raised by SoCal Activity
Keywords: usgs refs, landers
Organization: NAS, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 92 22:23:57 GMT

In article <51084@seismo.CSS.GOV> stead@skadi.CSS.GOV (Richard Stead) writes:
>In article <jester.713904311@crash>, jester@crash.cts.com (Ken Bibb) writes:
>> 3)  Can you give me references for the role of plate tectonics in the
>>     creation of the Sierra Nevada, Owens Valley, White and Panamint ranges
>>     and Death Valley?  Note:  The Front Range of the Rocky Mountains also
>>     lines up between the Mendocino and Murray fracture zones projected
>>     eastward.  Has the eastward movement of the Sierra Nevada stopped?  Is
>>     that why the beginnings of movement with the Pacific Plate?
>
>A good layman's book on CA geology is "Geology of California" by Norris and
>Webb (publisher is Wiley, original copyright is 1976).

Norris and Webb is a standard 1st quarter geology of CA text.  A fine book.

...
>and basins are horsts and grabens in an extensional regime (there also

Others:  Death Valley in particular is C.B. Hunt's book on Death Valley,
named "Death Valley."

Bob Sharp's K/H Series of geology field guide (pink cover) and that yellow
covered guide (I forget the author).  Far better to see some of this stuff
in the field.

--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eugene@orville.nas.nasa.gov
  Resident Cynic, Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers
  {uunet,mailrus,other gateways}!ames!eugene
Second Favorite email message: Returned mail: Cannot send message for 3 days
A Ref: Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning, vol. 1, G. Polya
From: paulb@harley.tti.com (Paul Blumstein)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Personal Tales of Big Earthquakes
Date: 12 Aug 92 16:17:29 GMT
Organization: Are you kidding?

In article <4217@wet.UUCP> c@wet.UUCP (Chuck Charlton) writes:
+This is the first line that gets truncated on my system
+
+Several of us were eating dinner in San Ramon.  We had been
+seated at our table when the building began to shake.  We had
+been served one cocktail by then.
+
+Being an old hand at the earthquake experience by then, I reached
+in my pocket and put a dollar bill on the table.  I said, "Four point
+seven."
+
+Others reached in their pockets and put their money where their 
+mouths were.  Boy was I wrong!.

Reminds me of a small quake I felt several years after moving to LA.

After the minor tremor, my wife said:  That was a little one.  I replied:
"Either a little one nearby or San Francisco is no longer there".  She
never call a tremor "a little one" again.
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            Transaction Technology, Inc., Santa Monica, CA
From: rah@public.BTR.COM (Richard A Hyde  rah@btr.com)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Interesting State Report on Loma Prieta (free)
Date: 21 Aug 92 15:34:39 GMT
Distribution: ca
Organization: BTR Public Access UNIX, MtnView CA. Contact: Customer Service cs@BTR.COM

In article <22227@venera.isi.edu> rogers@blips.isi.edu (Craig Milo Rogers) writes:
|In article <7736@public.BTR.COM> rah@public.BTR.COM (Richard A Hyde  rah@btr.com) writes:
|>
|>
|>	Competing Against Time
|>	Report to Governor George Deukmejian
|>        from
|>        The Governor's Board of Inquiry
|>        on the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake
|>        May 1990
|>
|>(916) 322-6312 to order a copy for myself.  
|
|	This document is no longer free.  I was told to send a $3.00
|check or money order to:
|
|	Attn: Cashier
|	Governor's Office of Planning
|	1400 10th St.
|	Sacramento, CA 95814
|
|and include, of course, the title of the document.
|

Sorry, folks.  When I called last week, they not only sent me the report
for free, but the sent it First Class Mail!   Now it appears that they
are charging for it  :-(  No wonder California still doen't have a budget!

I probably got some some new person on the phone... oh well.

Apologies for anyone that was misled.  Still, IMHO, it's well worth the 
$3.00  :-)  Great shots of the Cypress Structure and the Bay Bridge with
detailed engineering diagrams.

Rick


-- 
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Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
From: eugene@wilbur.nas.nasa.gov (Eugene N. Miya)
Subject: AGU was : Landers 
Organization: NAS, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 92 00:48:35 GMT
Distribution: ca

In article <1992Aug19.153316.21249@unocal.com> stgprao@xing.unocal.com
(Richard Ottolini) writes:
>AGU.  The meeting is Dec 7-11 in San Francisco.

Actually, might be a good time for a net meeting (dinner).
I went up last year and to meet Seismo Lab friend Ahrens and Smither
(met her for the first time in person) and other geo friends.
We did Indian food that evening (went to Dallas the day following).

Besides Richard, we are going to have some interesting SIGGRAPH meetings
up coming. 8^)

--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eugene@orville.nas.nasa.gov
  Resident Cynic, Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers
  {uunet,mailrus,other gateways}!ames!eugene
Second Favorite email message: Returned mail: Cannot send message for 3 days
A Ref: Mathematics and Plausible Reasoning, vol. 1, G. Polya
From: Richard.Mathews@West.Sun.COM (Richard M. Mathews)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Power LInes
Date: 21 Aug 92 22:16:09 GMT
Organization: Sunsoft Inc., Los Angeles, CA.
NNTP-Posting-Host: smaug.West.Sun.COM

tpickett@auspex.com (Tom Pickett) writes:
>I think you need some sort of conductive medium to be electrocuted
>simply being near the power cable.  I also think I'm very lucky.

With a sufficient voltage gradient, even air is an adequately conductive
medium.  Stay away from those wires!

Richard M. Mathews			Lietuva laisva = Free Lithuania
Internet:   richard@locus.com		Brivu Latviju  = Free Latvia
UUCP:	    ...!uunet!lcc!richard	Eesti vabaks   = Free Estonia
MIL/BITNET: richard%lcc@UUNET.UU.NET	        WE  DID  IT!!!
From: hannah@pomponio.ai.sri.com (Marsha Jo Hannah)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Power LInes
Date: 19 Aug 92 20:18:19 GMT
	<1992Aug19.190251.23150@netlabs.com>
Organization: SRI International, Menlo Park, CA
In-reply-to: lwall@netlabs.com's message of 19 Aug 92 19:02:51 GMT

In article <1992Aug19.190251.23150@netlabs.com> lwall@netlabs.com (Larry Wall) writes:

   P.S.  Hint.  With a manual transmission you can move a car a little
   ways even if you can't start the engine, as long as the battery and
   starter still work.  Just remember what happened the last time you
   tried to start your car in gear...

Unless, of course, one has one of these newfangled modern cars with a
safety interlock, which requires that the clutch be *fully* depressed
before it will let the starter motor turn over....  Grrrr....

mjh
From: rhockins@enrico.tmc.edu (Russell Hockins)
Newsgroups: ca.earthquakes
Subject: Re: Personal Tales of Big Earthquakes
Date: 18 Aug 92 19:06:14 GMT
Distribution: ca
Organization: /etc/organization

In article <64197@cup.portal.com> Harv@cup.portal.com (Harv R Laser) writes:
>>>
>drum-seismometer. But probably too much information on the screen at
>once for the average television viewer to grasp, (in the minds of 
>the news producers), so we get the drum recorders again.
>
You think that is bad?  How about the sound track they *still* use on
most tv news broadcasts that has the noise of teletypes in the background?
I find it hard to believe that in this modern age of computers, faxes and
other high-tech equipment, that *any* newsroom still has these antiques in
use.

I worked as a teletype operator in the early 80's and I know that they have
been [ or at least can be ] replace by their modern computerized decendant.


-- 
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