Today I experienced my first earthquake. I was interviewing two people in our downtown office on the 8th floor when the room started to shake. The former Californian in the room started saying, "that's an earthquake; that's an earthquake." I turned around to the glass window overlooking the building lobby and saw that everything was swaying and shaking. Talk about surreal and freaky. At the point I asked, "Should we be worried about this?" The answer was yes and we quickly left our room of glass walls (no joke).
A 6.0 earthquake felt up an down the East coast is no small deal. In the end, it turned out to be a shocking minute, but nothing too dangerous or damaging in the long run, thankfully. The biggest aftershock was the commute home. The metro reopened within the hour, but the trains were only running at 15 miles an hour. The "earthquake express" wasn't prepared for the flood of people who were suddenly eager to get home at 3 pm. Cattle cars offer a more pleasant ride. The roadways were just as bad, but seemed to thin out by the end of the night.
On days like this I'm grateful for family and friends. I'm also thankful for my bike and for Twitter. I had a few errands to run in the neighborhood and my bike saved me from the traffic nightmare. I love Twitter every day, but it is especially valuable on days like today. To quote Darren Rovell, "not many companies can say they're at their best when the world is at its worst, but Twitter is one of them." It's the best way to get news and monitor essentially a city-wide dispatch system in emergency situations. Once everyone realized they were going to be okay today, the Twitterverse lit up with clever remarks about the quake. I'm sharing some of my favorites below.
Best of Twitter #DCquake:
RT @MarshallRamsey: Apparently quake happened along the "it's your fault" line that runs from Capitol to White House.
RT @katz: "I felt that earthquake last week" - Brooklyn hipster
RT @kbondelli BREAKING: S&P has downgraded the DC quake from a 5.8 to a 5+.
RT @adamjclarkson: images of earthquake devastaion in washington, DC http://bit.ly/rauALk
RT There was just a 5.8 earthquake in Washington. Obama wanted it to be 3.4, but the Republicans wanted 5.8, so he compromised.
RT @hodgman This guy in the cafe and I agree that we liked the earthquake when it first started. But now it's like, the wrong people are into it.
1 comment:
Yes, that was craziness! How freaky to be in a high rise with glass windows! The earthquake here in NY wasn't as dramatic. Glad that you were safe.
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