soubriquet 0 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Golly gosh! Five emails from SnowJapan wishing me happy 59th birthday. I see some catastrophists have predicted May 21st as the End of the World. Cool. Mr T (he shares my birthdate) and I have ordered beers and popcorn. We are going to sit back and watch the action. I'll report back on Sunday morning. Moving on. Hello everyone. We are doing OK here, recovering from significant disruption. Link to post Share on other sites
big-will 7 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 No, the end of the world is 2012 isn't it? Long time, soubs. How were you affected by all the action from March? Link to post Share on other sites
igloo 3 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 I got 5 too. Very friendly. Link to post Share on other sites
SnowJapan Admin SnowJapan 178 Posted May 21, 2011 SnowJapan Admin Share Posted May 21, 2011 I like being friendly. How was your experience with everything, soubriquet? Link to post Share on other sites
BagOfCrisps 24 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Scary stuff. But what time zone is the 6pm timing? Can someone tell me please. ----- The source: Harold Camping, 89, from Oakland, California, is certain that Saturday is Judgment Day The Rapture, another name for Judgement Day, is supposedly the time when God's chosen people will ascend to heaven and the rest of us are left behind to face apocalyptic scenes of earthquakes and fire. The 'trial' for non-believers could last six months, but by October 21 they will all be dead, says the prophecy. The calculation has been dismissed as 'flat-out wrong' by one leading Christian author, who accused Camping of abusing the current climate of fear rendered by natural disasters to make money. Link to post Share on other sites
grungy-gonads 54 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Bloody hell, that's before United lift the trophy and then go on to play the CL final (again). Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 21, 2011 Author Share Posted May 21, 2011 Hello everyone. Perhaps a time to mend fences. We had no signficant damage, but being thrown off the ground caught my attention. Business suffered, down to 30% of normal. Things are normal-ish here. Gummint intervention has helped with cash flow problems. Mighty Norwich now in the Premiere League. Watch out ManU, Chelski and the Arse. The Fearsome Canaries are going to get you. Link to post Share on other sites
Tubby Beaver 209 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Bags, apparently it sweeps across the planet sticking religiously (pardon the pun) to the time zones.....so it starts in your country at 6pm local time. That means of course that we will have already been raptured into heaven and can laugh as you and 2pints are left behind Hey Soubs, welcome back. Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 21, 2011 Author Share Posted May 21, 2011 6pm. Cool. I finish work at 4. That gives me enough time to have a shower, change my undies and get stuck into the beers. This is going to be fun. The earthquakes (2) were both 5- here. I knew from the 1st motion they were coming from Miyagi. The worst part was knowing there and then that things were going to be very very bad for a lot of people. The house is built to M8 standard, so no worries there. Everything was leaping around and some stuff fell off shelves, but for us it was trivial. The power went off for 2 days, and water for three. I filled the bath immediately after the quake and that saw us through. We have candles, torches and a radio, and we cook with bottled gas, so we were OK. Things were pretty dull without power and heat. The real problem was having no fuel deliveries for 2-3 weeks. Without fuel nothing could be delivered to those in need. With the Tohoku Expressway closed and the Shinkansen stopped, everything had to come in via Niigata, and that's a long slow journey. It's been a reminder just how vulnerable society is to disruption. We use a lot of egg white. Kewpie (sp?) couldn't supply because they had no cartons. The carton supplier was shut because they had no printing ink. Link to post Share on other sites
grungy-gonads 54 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Originally Posted By: soubriquet The earthquakes (2) were both 5- here. I knew from the 1st motion they were coming from Miyagi. How did you know that soubs? Link to post Share on other sites
grungy-gonads 54 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Originally Posted By: soubriquet Mighty Norwich now in the Premiere League. Watch out ManU, Chelski and the Arse. The Fearsome Canaries are going to get you. Like they did last time hey? Link to post Share on other sites
muikabochi 208 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Originally Posted By: grungy-gonads Originally Posted By: soubriquet The earthquakes (2) were both 5- here. I knew from the 1st motion they were coming from Miyagi. How did you know that soubs? Interesting that, but with the initial March 11th one I sensed right from the beginning that it was coming from far away. It was much more of a boat on the sea kind of wobbling, even though it recorded a 4 or lower 5. It wasn't really noisy either. Compare that with the shindo 5+ we got the next morning from the much more local north Nagano/Niigata one which was a violent and noisy up and down and all over the place shaking. What a lovely way to be woken up at 4am! I really wish I had less experience of these things. Hi soubriquet. You staying with us this time? Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 21, 2011 Author Share Posted May 21, 2011 Hello team. If I promise not to be rude, will you let me stay? g-g. Earthquakes produce two types of waves directly, and generate a 3rd type when the energy reaches the the Earths's surface. P-waves are pressure waves and are oriented towards and away from the epicentre. S-waves are shear waves and move side-to-side, so to speak. P-waves travel faster than S-waves, so if you are any distance from the earthquake, the first arrival will always throw you towards the origin. The first earthquake nearly chucked me backwards out of my chair, so I knew it was coming from the east. It went on for a long time, and there was a distinct transition in the motion from P- to S-waves. The duration told me it was a long way off and the magnitude told me it was very very big. The 3rd type of waves are Rayleigh waves, or ground roll. These are the same as surface waves on the ocean, where a cork describes a vertically oriented circle. Rayleigh waves aren't particularly energetic and they don't travel far, but if you are close to the source, the vertical motion can be very damaging. Muika describes this perfectly, the first earthquake wobbling around, and the second (closer) up and down. Top marks for excellent observation. Link to post Share on other sites
Mantas 3 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Originally Posted By: soubriquet The first earthquake nearly chucked me backwards out of my chair, so I knew it was coming from the east. It went on for a long time, and there was a distinct transition in the motion from P- to S-waves. The duration told me it was a long way off and the magnitude told me it was very very big. Bloody hell Soub! You did well to note all that in the middle of a disaster. Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 21, 2011 Author Share Posted May 21, 2011 I am a geo, mantas, and 1/6th of my undergraduate degree is geophysics. The course was taught by the renowned Fred Vine, who in addition to being an absolutely top bloke, set the gold standard in clarity and organisation. It was a fascinating course and I was a diligent student. Even after 30 years I still retain the information, so I'm tuned in. Link to post Share on other sites
JA2340 16 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Welcome back, soubs ... Where the hell have you been? (PM if you don't feel like being public with it). Oh, and happy birthday (for whenever it was ) My vote is to let you stay, not that my vote carries any weight around here!! Link to post Share on other sites
HelperElfMissy 42 Posted May 21, 2011 Share Posted May 21, 2011 Soubs...awfully glad to see you again And I am glad you weathered the quake without too much disruption. Something like this must be a strange mix of raw fear (normal person style) and pure excitement (geo style) OH! And Happy Birthday Old Fella! Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 22, 2011 Author Share Posted May 22, 2011 Wow. Thanks. It was scary alright, you are utterly in the lap of the gods, with no idea how big it's going to be, or how long it will last. But truly, the worst part was knowing that right there and then, some poor souls were dying a horrible death. Anyway, how was everyone's winter? We had about 14 metres of snow, about 2 metres more than average. The memsahib bought me this for Christmas, a snow pusher. Brilliant. I'm going to buy her a vacuum cleaner for her birthday Link to post Share on other sites
HelperElfMissy 42 Posted May 22, 2011 Share Posted May 22, 2011 c'mon Soubs! Everyone knows blokes like toys with motors - girls like shiny things! No vacuum unless it is one of these: Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 22, 2011 Author Share Posted May 22, 2011 What's that? Can it do the stairs? I want one. The Yukios is brilliant. It does about 5 times more work than I can manage, meaning I can clear the shopfront, footpath and parking in around 2 hours. And down into the magic hole it goes. Link to post Share on other sites
HelperElfMissy 42 Posted May 22, 2011 Share Posted May 22, 2011 ooooohhh A magic hole! I'd like one of those in my house for the crap my kids leave lying around! The flying saucer is a Roomba iRobot Vacuum - no it doesn't do stairs, but it does know when to stop at them. I am SO after one of these babies - especially now we have the disabled puppy. Every time I pull out the vacuum she goes berserk and I am worried I am going to hurt her with the stupid thing. This way I could set it to go off at night when she is asleep (and me too). Link to post Share on other sites
pie-eater 207 Posted May 22, 2011 Share Posted May 22, 2011 None of this matters. The world ends in about 25 minutes. Link to post Share on other sites
muikabochi 208 Posted May 22, 2011 Share Posted May 22, 2011 Originally Posted By: soubriquet The house is built to M8 standard, so no worries there. Soubriquet, can you explain that? I thougth they were built to certain 'shindo' standards, rather than a magnitudes, as - in my understanding - magnitude doesnt really say much about how much somewhere shakes in a particular place, whereas shindo does... Link to post Share on other sites
soubriquet 0 Posted May 22, 2011 Author Share Posted May 22, 2011 That question has lead to some research and discussion. The memsahib dug up some totally unintelligible equations. My understanding is this (I could be wrong). Earthquake 1 was Magnitude 9, using the moment magnitude scale, namely the amount of energy released at the hypocentre. Shindo, as you rightly state, is the degree of shaking at a particular location, not the same thing. Shindo only runs to 7, but with the subdivisions (lower/upper) actually has 10 divisions. I should re-phrase that. This house is built to Shindo 6+ standard. For wooden buildings: "Many, less earthquake-resistant houses collapse. In some cases, even walls and pillars of highly earthquake-resistant houses are heavily damaged." That equates approximately to an M8 earthquake locally. My point. The house is a steel framed lightweight structure. It is very flexible and well-bolted to the ground. It meets the current standards. Link to post Share on other sites
muikabochi 208 Posted May 22, 2011 Share Posted May 22, 2011 I get your point, soubriquet. It's nice to live somewhere that seems fairly strong to quakes. The shindo scale is 1, 2, 3, 4, lower 5, upper 5, lower 6, upper 6 and 7. So that's 9 different ones if I am counting right. When I first moved into my place the guy said it was strong for earthquakes and I remember just going "yeah, like, wow". I'm glad it is though as it has gone through a lower 6 and a fair few 5s itself. Quote: That equates approximately to an M8 earthquake locally. Not sure I get this comment either soubs - how locally and how far underground? That's the problem with magnitude it just doesn't tell you what's going on up top in a certain place. Chuetsu was M6.9 I remember correctly. That gave off a shindo 7 in Kawaguchi-machi. I sure would not like to be within 500km of a M8, I tell you! Link to post Share on other sites
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