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It was a
strange week, all told. From the morning of Monday 21 October
2002, when the floor, ceiling, walls and everything in between first
shook (at around 8:45am), while spaceman lay in bed, puzzled by the
sudden movement, asking spaceman's non-resident other half why the
commotion, it was clear that something funny was going on. As
everyone arrived at work, the talk was of the mysterious shaking in
the morning and it became clear that
Manchester
, of all places had been struck by a minor earthquake, which measured
3.2 on the Richter scale.
But it was
later that day, at 12:42pm, that the fun really began. Out of
nowhere, the whole place shook, the floor felt like jelly - it wasn't
frightening, though; it was more fascination at the power of which
this planet is capable. This was the biggie, scoring 3.9 on the
Richter scale. Then, as if purely for the purpose of those who
weren't paying attention the first time (or caught on the loo), and to
give others a re-run, everything shook again, but less violently this
time. The second one wasn't quite as strong, everyone felt,
being a bit like the former quake's little brother. It became
clear that we were in the midst of a series
of tremors.
The
internet provided a useful haven for those seeking more information on
this amazing phenomenon. It was discovered that
Manchester
was being subjected to a rare "quake
swarm" and that there were more tremors than were being felt.
It became a regular occurrence over the next week, so much so that the
typically black-humoured Mancunians began to treat it as being run of
the mill. Used to endless drizzle rather than violent storms, it
was typical for
Manchester
to have lots of little quakes rather than one major one. Having
said that, it did feel like the apocalypse was on its way when an
almighty thunderclap shocked everyone at lunchtime on the Friday of
the first "earthquake week", with some people blubbering
that it was a bomb.
Spaceman
did a fair share of the research too, discovering the home page of the
British Geological Society, which
gave far more detail on what was happening, including details
of every quake to have struck
Manchester
since the start of the "swarm". This showed that the
first quakes actually occurred in the early hours of the Saturday
before the famous Monday, but they were too minor to be felt. By
the 30th of November, around a hundred or so quakes had
been counted...
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