– A 7 magnitude earthquake hit southcentral Alaska this morning at 8:29 AM local time.
-From where I am, 300 miles north, I felt it as a small rumble, like some road equipment outside on the street. It lasted about a minute.
-I looked it up on Facebook, where folks always like to post “did you feel that?” and quickly realized it wasn’t a small shake, but a big one, about 12 miles north of my home town.
-My dad called, kind of shaken, wondering if I felt it and telling me the power was out and all the dishes and everything not heavy or stable was knocked over.
-At first, there was only one image that started circling around immediately:
-I texted my mom “That was a quake! felt it here.” no response. I wasn’t too worried at first. Her boyfriend called, then texted. Said he was fine, she was fine, but the store was ‘broken.’. My mom was at work at the grocery store in town, and I hadn’t seen any images yet, but saw some from others in town. Mostly broken shelves, drop ceilings, and items on the floor.
-Eventually, my mom sent this photo:
-She said her first thought, as she was cashiering for a man and his two daughters, was to tell them to get under the small area in the checkstand and cover their head. The quake lasted about a minute, but she told them to stay there because there was going to be another. Sure enough, an aftershock happened.
-After that, everyone left the store because of broken pipes and possible live electricity on the floor.
-No fatalities or injuries that anyone I know reported. As of 7 PM there were officially no fatalities or injuries directly related to it. Lots of structural damage.
-My friend’s house, down the road from my husband’s parent’s place, is a wreck. Luckily they weren’t living in it since they were trying to sell it, but it’s going to be hard to sell now.
-There have been major damages to roads and buildings. Traffic is backed up all over, but so far everyone is fine and some power is back online for people who lost it.
This is the weirdest sensation, being so far from everything I call home. But here’s a perspective of what’s going on, in our little corner of the world.
Just to recap, tomorrow will not be a normal day. But at no one is hurt.
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