LAFAYETTE, CALIFORNIA – A magnitude 3.3 earthquake hit San Ramon, California last night.
Ugh, I know…again.
It feels like we’ve been covering earthquakes all the time recently, because the 925 has been seeing tons of them.
Thing is, they’re little. They’re the kinds of quakes that cause your desk to lightly jiggle, or perhaps your cat to briefly look up, stare into space in a somewhat startled way, and then go back to sleep.
The main damage they cause comes from the 10 minutes you’ll waste entering “Earthquake?” into Google and then scouring Nextdoor for posts about other people having “felt it.”
I know, little earthquakes can be fun. They’re a reminder that we live in California, a place where the earth literally moves under our feet. And it’s a good excuse to talk to your neighbors about something other than politics and parking.
Brits have the weather–we have temblors.
Still, as a newsroom, we’re growing mighty tired of combing through the USGS website, regurgitating facts about slip planes (I think that’s a thing…), shaking intensity (spoiler alert: low), and epicenters (as if that’s even an appropriate word to use for a seismic event that barely moved your coffee mug.)
So let’s make a deal. If there’s a truly big or impactful earthquake, we’ll let you know about it. In fact, we’ll probably be the fools running around with a camera while the ground opens up and starts swallowing houses, and trees crash down around us.
Until then, though, we’re not going to bother writing up every little teensy quake that briefly jiggles your monitor.
If you’re wondering whether you felt it, let’s just agree that the answer is “Yes”, the impact is minimal, and we can all go back to caring about more interesting things, like new ramen restaurants and hawks in places that hawks shouldn’t be.
Thanks for your cooperation. Most sincerely, the Bay Area Telegraph.
