Earthquake in 2011

A 5.8 magnitude earthquake centered in Virginia has been felt across the area with people experiencing shaking buildings and slight tremors. The earthquake was centered near Louisa, Va., which is northwest of Richmond and about 230 miles southwest of Philadelphia. There were also two aftershocks in Virginia, both below a 3-magnitude. The U.S. Geological Survey said the earthquake was half a mile deep. Reports were coming in throughout Tuesday afternoon and evening of minor damage in the area. During the earthquake I was sitting one the couch with my dad. And my mother was sitting right across from me. And in the living room were my two god sisters and my biological sister and her friend. I felt the earth shake but when I first felt it I was unsure of what it was. My mom assured me that is was an earthquake. Nothing was damaged in my house. When the earthquake happened I wasn’t scared. I really didn’t have time to be scared because it happened so fast. This was the first earthquake I had ever experienced. I am just glad that I was at home. Philadelphia really never experiences earthquakes. It is very rare for us to have earthquakes. Most people living in California have at one time or another experienced an earthquake. Earthquakes are the Earth's natural means of releasing stress. When the Earth's plates move against each other, stress is put on the lithosphere. When this stress is great enough, the lithosphere breaks or shifts. Imagine holding a pencil horizontally. If you were to apply a force to both ends of the pencil by pushing down on them, you would see the pencil bend. After enough force was applied, the pencil would break in the middle, releasing the stress you have put on it. The Earth's crust acts in the same way. As the plates move they put forces on themselves and each other. When the force is large enough, the crust is forced to break. When the break occurs, the stress is released as energy which moves through the Earth in the form of waves, which we feel and call an earthquake.