earthquakes

Map of CL

The above link is a map of Chile. And more importantly a map of the town most recently hit by an earthquake. It happened on Wednesday at about 12:40 pm local time. The town most closely affected was Tocopilla. As you can see by the map, it is in pretty close range to Iquique. The magnitude of the quake was about a 7.7. There have been at least 3 aftershocks reported since then.

Now I don't know about you, but this is pretty scary. I don't like it when the earth moves out of control beneath your very feet. I don't like the idea of not being able to predict such an event. I've been in California when an earthquake hit. But thankfully it was only a low magnitude one, and we were far from the center. But still, it was a pretty spooky feeling to see the ceiling fan swinging back and forth. My family outside didn't even realize what had happened.

Now apparently Chile has a lot of tectonic activities. Movement of the tectonic plates, ie:earthquakes. Lovely. I didn't know this. Let's call someone and tell them we can't go. I'm not all in. I'm a little freaked out. Oh yeah, and there are some volcanos over there too. Maybe we should just move someplace nice like San Antonio? They don't have much excitement over there do they? And shoot, I could still learn to speak Spanish. Just not with Chileans.

Eeeeehhm. Hmm. Ok. I didn't get an official comment from dh. I'll have to get back with you on that. But I'm less than thrilled. I wonder if while we were stationed there and an earthquake occurred on our tour, would they cut it short? I mean, that would be grounds to send us back to the states. No?

hmmmm. Let me think about this some more. Oh yes, and the greatest earthquake of the 20th century goes to Chile. A whopping 9.5 on the Richter scale. Or so I read. It happened in May of 1960. And of course they say it should happen again.

I'm not liking the thought of this very much. I need to go and eat something chocolate.