Whole lotta shakin' going on in Ohio
Pastor Dale Morgan
Whole lotta shakin' going on in Ohio*
Cleveland area records dozen small quakes in first half of year
Wednesday, August 2, 2006 Posted: 1448 GMT (2248 HKT)
MENTOR, Ohio (AP) -- A corner of suburban Cleveland has become the
earthquake capital of Ohio, shaking on average every two weeks since New
Year's Day and making people wonder: What's next?
The quakes haven't caused any serious problems and sometimes even go
unnoticed. Experts aren't sure why they are happening, but they do know
they are happening frequently: Twelve were recorded in the area by July 1.
"I heard one," said Jim Farrell, 79, of Mentor, a retired plasterer with
an eye for wall damage. Still, he hasn't seen any damage and hasn't felt
any of the quakes recorded in Lake County and under adjacent Lake Erie.
The earthquakes have been small, measuring from magnitude 2.0 to 3.8. In
comparison, the 1994 quake that hit the Northridge area of Los Angeles,
California, was a 6.7 magnitude.
Though they are occurring often now, earthquakes aren't uncommon in the
region. Lake County has been the site for 14 of the 20 earthquakes
recorded in the state in the past two years. The quakes result from a
fault, or crack, that is under pressure, one of a number of faults in
Ohio, most of which are under the sedimentary bedrock.
Ground zero for keeping track of the Lake County earthquakes is a busy
classroom building on the Lakeland Community College campus, where a
seismic monitor sits on the concrete floor of a tiny closet housing
electric boxes.
The monitor is sensitive enough to pick up the rumblings of a heavy
truck along nearby Interstate 90, according to David Pierce, an
assistant geology professor who keeps tabs on readings forwarded to the
statewide Ohio Seismic Network near Columbus.
To Pierce, a low-level earthquake "always feels like a semi
[tractor-trailer] coming down my street and hits a rock or a speed
bump," sending a boom like a burst of compressed air.
Pierce, like police and fire departments, can get dozens of calls when
an earthquake strikes, often from people happy to learn that it didn't
do damage and wasn't a terror attack.
Without damage or injury from the series of quakes, the question for
many is: Will the next one be worse?
"The official take is: We don't know," Pierce said.
The frequent quakes have prompted some caution among officials. A top
concern for some Lake County authorities is the Perry Nuclear Power
Plant, which was constructed to withstand a building-shaking 6.0
earthquake and opened in 1987 a year after a 5.0 quake in Lake County.
The biggest of the recent earthquakes, a 3.8 temblor recorded June 20,
automatically set off alarms to alert a plant command post. That sent 30
inspectors on a four-hour search for any indication of cracked pipes or
other damage.
None was found, Perry spokeswoman Jennifer Young said. The plant
remained in operation without interruption during detailed inspections
of cement walls and pipelines reinforced with shock absorbers to handle
shaking.
Data indicates homeowners aren't making many changes to protect against
the quakes. There is little evidence that many homeowners have made
moves to buy earthquake insurance, said Gary Christy with the Westfield
Group insurance. Nine percent of the Westfield-insured homes in Lake
County have earthquake insurance.
Nationwide Insurance agent Gerald Merhar in nearby Willoughby said about
15 percent of his homeowner policies have earthquake coverage riders
costing about $20 a year for a frame home and $30 for brick.
Merhar, 57, whose own home has a repaired crack from a quake more than
50 years ago, recommends coverage, especially for brick homes. "They
don't shake well," he said.