I felt it, it was terrible experience, it was so strong that it was felt across wide regions. Luckily the epicenter was a bit far from major cities.
At first i did not realize why my chair was shaking as i was using headphones, then for at least 10sec i couldn’t even stand. We spent the night outside
I remember the first earthquake I experienced. Same feeling: everything around me started shaking; for several seconds, I couldn't figure out what was happening; and then it suddenly hit me: it's an earthquake.
(I'm from a country where earthquakes do not occur. For some reason, I always thought that earthquakes were accompanied by, well, movie-style earthquake sounds. It was kinda eye-opening to realize that earthquakes are silent...)
Silent? I think they are the exact opposite. I experienced a very very minor earthquake in New England and it sounded like a truck roaring down the road
I was 150 or so kms away from the Turkey earthquake this year which martyred 50,000+. It was big. We shaked in the 2nd floor of our house. Some people in the same room heard a very loud noise it while others didn’t. I didn’t. I guess it’s just below the average audible frequency range.
I was in the earthquake in the balkans last year and didnt hear anything. And while I wasnt in the center everything in the apartment was shaking and some stuff fell down.
Earthquakes are not silent. I'm not sure where you experienced yours but earthquakes are deafeningly loud. Movie-style earthquake sounds don't even do it justice.
I was in an apartment building in Santiago, Chile—in fact, pretty much all of the earthquakes I experienced were in Santiago. Never heard any (out of the normal) sounds. Is that because the buildings were built to handle earthquakes?
I was in a heavily affected part of LA during the Northridge quakes. It did 50b in damage, killed people, injured thousands. The most significant noise I remember was the cacophony of car alarms and people screaming.
Our house didn't collapse. If it had, i'd probably remember that noise.
Memory is faulty, so who knows. Maybe it was loud, but that's not what I remember, so I can understand why the descriptions vary so broadly.
No good footage of the Northridge event is really very available, but there is plenty of detailed (and unfortunately graphic) footage of the 2015 Nepal event, the 'sounds of chaos' far and wide out-match the sound of the low rumbling quake -- but that could be a deception of the microphones; I would imagine most of them lack the range to properly capture the low roar of an earthquake.
I heard a very small one somewhere that really isn't meant to get them, through a TV show in earbuds. Perhaps the volume has something to do with what's happening beneath the surface vs magnitude? In our case, as far as I know, the epicentre was a ~5h drive away (and out at sea), but it sounded about the same as loud subs at a concert to me.
I was in an earthquake in the balkans last year. Didnt hear a thing. Everything vibrated and some stuff fell down though. But it was still quite far from the epicenter (perhaps that is where you hear it).
Earthquakes are by no means silent. Earthquakes are accompanied by a deep rumble. I have experienced many earthquakes unfortunately, including a deadly 7.1 magnitude quake and its many aftershocks.
The 5 earthquakes I can remember experiencing all took place when I was indoors and all I can really remember for sound is the building creaking. Followed by a bunch of "did you feel that?"
I have never experienced an earthquake directly, but I once visited life safety learning center at Ikebukuro Fire Station in Tokyo and had the opportunity to experience the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011 on a simulator there. Even if you are prepared for it, it is terrible. It's hard to imagine how people living ordinary lives feel when something like this starts.
The amazing ordinariness of the disaster. I wonder if the residents of settlements around the Gulf of Naples also normalized the smoke over Vesuvius after Pompeii and Herculaneum were destroyed? „Is it the big one?“
There's nothing ordinary about any disasters or upcoming disasters especially earthquakes . The early signs are there but we need to look into them very carefully and not taking anything for granted. The largest and most lethal Tokyo earthquake happened exactly 100 years ago reportedly killing more than 10K residents, namely the Great Kantō earthquake back in 1923 [1]. Imagine if similar disaster now with the huge number of current Tokyo population. That's probably the reason the Tokyo residents are paranoid now, and righly so.
At the moment we have good results for predicting earthquakes (not forecasting) that should be able to warn the residents a few days before the impending major earthquake. The results are consistent based on offline data of the recent Turkeys, New Zealand, Indonesia and Philippines earthquakes. Hopefully we can reliably repeat the early detection capability with the real-time data, if fundings are available. If anyone know how to approach Japan government (or Turkish, NZ, etc) for funding the system please let me know in the comments.
I’m not saying disasters are ordinary in general. If you are living with a continuous expectation of something terrible to happen, if this expectation becomes a part of your ordinary life, that is the feeling I’m talking about.
Deepest condolences to one of nicest people on earth. I had to been to Morocco on a vacation and the warmth and welcomeness was highlight of the trip. On top of that, people of Morocco love kids and accommodate a lot.
Wide statements with just general negative content, totally politically incorrect.
I have travelled there and yes if you spend time in the tourist places you face scammers often. The contrary is true when far away from stops - so I encourage all to discover in my opinion the best north africa country.
And a small hint: staying in a resort is probably the last way to really understand a country and culture.
Heh, I live in Spain, a country that receives a LOT of immigration from there, and I couldn't help but think "what kind of moroccans has this guy seen?"
We self criticize a lot and honestly tons of moroccans (outside the Diaspora, which can be oddly more nationalistic than actual people living in Morocco) know and will be honest about the flaws of Morocco and Moroccans. But honestly even then I never see even the most cynical of us call Moroccans "vile". It's just odd and not really criticism.
I'm also north african (in case the arabic in my parent comment didn't give it away).
Can you even be racist against your own broad ethnic group (by asking a member of it to not just paint large swathes of it as "vile and barbaric", no less)?
I have a stellar contract SDE from Morocco. Aside from the humanitarian tragedy of this earthquake, my eyes have been opened to the challenges young professionals with Visas face in the US. They tend to be ripe for exploitation by hiring firms and contract agencies.
Where did you get your education? Serious question.
Borders have nothing to do with colonialism. There is no human right to move and settle where you please, especially in this day and age where that entitles you to many social services paid for by taxes.
A nation that does not control its borders is no longer a nation. No country on earth behaves that way. Not now, nor in the past.
A nation that does not control its borders is no longer a nation. No country on earth behaves that way. Not now, nor in the past.
The world was different, of course, but the USA basically (and I thought rather famously) behaved this way until around the Civil War period, and it remained relatively open until about the First World War.
You’re right, that’s an important exception. To be fair that’s a decent policy in an era before taxes and social programs, and when you’re presiding over a vast, largely empty new territory.
I would make the case that the cost of a one way sea ticket to the US in those days was something of a restriction. But still very unrestricted compared to today.
The U.S. Government sent its first official communication to the Sultan of Morocco in December 1780. It read:
We the Congress of the 13 United States of North America, have been informed of your Majesty’s favorable regard to the interests of the people we represent, which has been communicated by Monsieur Etienne d’Audibert Caille of Sale, Consul of Foreign nations unrepresented in your Majesty’s states. We assure you of our earnest desire to cultivate a sincere and firm peace and friendship with your Majesty and to make it lasting to all posterity. Should any of the subjects of our states come within the ports of your Majesty’s territories, we flatter ourselves they will receive the benefit of your protection and benevolence. You may assure yourself of every protection and assistance to your subjects from the people of these states whenever and wherever they may have it in their power. We pray your Majesty may enjoy long life and uninterrupted prosperity.
I assume you’re interpreting that to mean there was unrestricted immigration from morroco. I don’t interpret it that way, I’d need to see more evidence.
There's no human right to do so simply because societies and governments have deemed it such. There's not really any decent reason it "shouldn't" be a right for well meaning people.
To be clear, I do agree that going somewhere else may grant you benefits you wouldn't have had in where you originally are from and that's due to taxes and other systems in place. But plenty of well meaning people who are skilled and willing to contribute to other societies are not allowed to do so just because they were born somewhere less fortunate or with certain stigmas attached.
Its a complex problem of course, free movement does let some bad apples in that can cause a lot of harm. But it can go too far in my opinion.
The problem of free movement is not bad apples, but simply too many apples. Even legal immigration is challenging to accommodate as a large influx of new residents disrupts everything from housing to culture.
I say this as an immigrant who helps immigrants immigtate, so I'm very much pro immigration.
I think he was questioning Visas and not borders. These are not the same thing. You can have tight borders but easy visas if the jobs are available. That being said, borders are really a new thing. In the past, people gathered in the city, but the "nation" didn't really have much oversight of what's happening in the forest. Many of the old world countries are divided by rivers, mountains and sea.
Indeed the word border is in there.
I wrote that word, followed by a few others that point out what other commenters jumped in with: confusion between border and inherent rights to move.
Nations and countries are made up things, you know that? They are not naturally human but a social constructs made up by those in power to have better grip on other people (their serfs) in the past. Usually countries started as kingdoms and the premise was clear.
Many societies of the past were conglomerations of tribes where each group/tribe had their own hierarchy and the various groups interacted with various kinds of hierarchy or lack thereof. Think of ancient Gaul or North American native nations. Despite them being formally independent groups, a common culture united people against what they perceived foreign. Gauls resisted Roman invasion, and even managed some degree of cohesion under Vercingetorix because they felt the threat of the common enemy.
You should read the Declaration of Independence :)
It is a right to live and settle wherever you please. In practice YMMV depending on different states’ ability to recognize rights, however.
And yes, the Declaration of Independence isn’t authoritative on the topic of rights, but it is a very clear cut explanation of how rights (ought to) work, without diving into the philosophy of it.
Borders have more than nothing to do with colonialism. but that wasn't my argument.
> A nation that does not control its border is no longer a nation.
Argument is about VISAs.
And so what? I would trade justice for the concept of nations if nations are prisons for many and wall gardens for a few.
> No country on earth behaves that way. Not now, nor in the past.
Whataboutism.
Again the argument is about VISAs, not borders, but was the U.S not a country?
> There is no human right to move and settle where you please
Does it not make the UN declaration absurd?
Article 23 is interesting.
"to just and favourable conditions of work"
So let's say, Michel. born in London.
Michel could be a citizen of some EU country, the US, South Korea or any of another dozen specific countries, that's about the same.
Equiped with his education or simply interest in trade and business, decides that what would please him most is to go to Singapore. Whether his desire is to settle or just to visit, he himself don't even know, so a short visit will do:
He goes to Singapore, gets a 90 days visit stamp on arrival.
Replace Michel by any of the billion(s) of citizens who don't have that privilege and the result is this:
- visa application in advance
- fees
- no guarantee to get it issued
Is this is compatible with "just and favourable conditions" and "right to employment" ?
> but those rights only apply within a particular country, the declaration says.
I hear you say.
Yet Michel from London can travel to most countries present on all continents, if that pleases him.
> that entitles you to many social services paid for by taxes.
Blame the benefit systems then if they are the barrier to true freedom of movement.
For precision, non tax payers also benefit from social services. In fact even more so than those who pay taxes.
It isn't about tax and a sensical distribution of benefits, that would easily be solved.
> Where did you get your education?
No idea why that would matter but here is a serious breakdown.
- early education from a private school
- then from a couple of public schools
- then from several semi private schools
- then from a state university
- then from another University, this time private.
From two countries, both former colonial empires and members of the United Nations. Signatories of the declaration which was meant to enshrine "the rights and freedom of all human beings."
There's no inherent truth of the universe that requires countries to have such disparate wealth that some are so much better to live in. I bet most people arguing for removing borders would also argue there should be much better global equality.
I don't know about peaceful but you could move. There were no visas and in fact no passports. Though, trying to get inside a "city" (ie: citadel) might be tricky. I guess they used gifts before to convince the other party.
That being said, if you settled somewhere in some large empty land, no one will complain.
Plenty of land was suitable for settlement (ie: Argentina). Mostly empty and competing empires were too far. Of course, after the discovery of the "new" world, the amount of empty land reduced significantly.
At least part of the reason that individuals traveled freely is that only rich individuals traveled.
Paupers from London didn't get on ships to the new world - not without selling themselves into indentured servitude.
When the economic barriers to migration fell to the point that subsistence farmers could travel between continents, we were always going to see either an equalization of living standards or the rise of political barriers.
Even before the adoption of visas, the traveling experience for a first class passenger on a ship was very different from third class getting routed via Ellis Island in the US.
That was within the country though, right? Not between countries? And this article [1] says enforcement of serfdom was localized and costly and there was de facto serf mobility.
I don’t know enough about history to say how connected colonialism and visas are, but it feels deeply unfair that citizens of some countries have many visa free countries (USA, Japan, Singapore have some of the best passports) while citizens in other countries have to deal with a ton of paperwork and uncertainty.
> VISAs are a left over abomination of colonialism.
This is patently false. Borders and border control are as ancient as human societies themselves and were not invented by those you deem "colonialists", which for you I bet doesn't include the Arabs and Persians themselves colonizing Europe...
Or the mongols...
Having been to some rural regions of the Atlas mountains not so long ago, many of the buildings are built onto precipices and do not look ready to withstand an earthquake.
I spend a lot of time in Morocco. I always wondered what an earthquake might do because they quite often build with simple cinderblock. The government actually sort of encourages it because official land ownership is not the norm and sometimes the government will raze buildings that were built without proper permits. Of course people couldn't really afford earthquake proof houses anyways. Sad situation all around. Was planning to go this winter, but I don't want to be a tourist in the midst of calamity.
Just putting out there that it might still be a good time to go:
I can’t speak to Morocco, but a number of SE Asian places derive significant incomes from tourism — and losing that after natural disasters compounds the problem.
There’s a possibility that visiting Morocco is bringing needed money into their community (as long as you’re not going to areas short on supplies). You need money to rebuild.
And tourism is ~7% of Morocco’s GDP (as of a few years ago).
In 1960 an earthquake in Agadir claimed almost half of the city's population. That gives you an idea about how badly prepared they were.
City has been rebuild (except from the hill were you can see the memorial words at night) supposedly under earthquake sagety norms but that isn't the case of the rest of the country.
> Was planning to go this winter, but I don't want to be a tourist in the midst of calamity.
I'm very conflicted on this one, it seems like this is the intuition I (along with a lot of people) want to reach for but is that actually the most helpful thing?
No, life goes on and it's not a calamity. It's pretty bad, but we'll have another crisis if tourism goes down because of the bad publicity of the earthquake.
For many Moroccans, welcoming tourists is their livelihoods. The best thing you can do to support them is to keep your plans in place.
I was playing with my cat that night when she started acting weird. Shortly after, I started hearing cracking noise inside the walls. That's when it hit me. Went to my roommate's room and woke him up and got out. It wasn't as strong as I thought but strong enough to get everyone out to the main street. As we sat down waiting for potential aftershocks I heard someone saying people died way down south. I googled "earthquake morocco" and first estimations showed a town that not that far from taroudant region where grandma lives(mountainous rural area). I tried calling but to no avail as the cell network was congested. We went home after an hour and a half passing out from the exhaustion. Woke up the next morning and called her, she was okay but it was strong enough to render the whole village(douar) petrified and make the decision to sleep outside... I got into social media afterwards and was shocked to hear that 320 people died in Al houz region... it's more than 2300 people as of writing this. May they rest in peace and give the victims families patience to get through these difficult times.
This is a map of almost all of the villages(dawawir) that were most impacted by the earthquake: https://goo.gl/maps/xdfG5YnHC6Z2vEci6 (thanks to whoever made it)
I think the Atlas range is still growing. That means plates coming together.
I lived in Morocco (and have visited Marrakesh), but that was in the late 1960s. I also lived in East Africa, where they still have some active vulcanism, but I think things are subsiding.
Morocco had a bad earthquake in Agadir, in 1960. A huge number of folks died. I think it was mostly poor people, who live in rather slapdash shanty towns.
According to the USGS search engine on that part of N. Africa, there've been no other quakes >= mag 6 in the region (nor for at least halfway down the AF coast) in 200 years. (The closest was in Portugal; Agadir was a 5.8.)(There were hundreds in the eastern Mediterranean.)
So it's been centuries. That can't have helped; many of those structures have been around -a long- time.
My understanding is that earthquake resistant buildings should be able to withstand up to 7 with negligible to slight damage. Hopefully governments take building codes more seriously.
Morocco is quite poor in rural areas. You have to be able to fund a solid building and regulations help little with that. Otherwise you just create lots of corruption.
Corrupt is a big deal, but not insurmountable. Convincing people that traditional methods aren’t earthquake resistant is one way to sidestep the issue.
It’s not particularly expensive to build somewhat earthquake resistant structures. Quite a lot of it comes down to building techniques rather than significant effort or expensive materials.
Multi story stone building generally do extremely poorly, but there’s a few cheap methods to significantly improve things such as timber bracing. The goal isn’t to make the building survive unscathed but to minimize casualties.
"Convincing people that traditional methods aren’t earthquake resistant is one way to sidestep the issue."
Actually, the really old traditional buildings in morroco are quite earthquake resistant, because they are still standing and it was not the first earthquake there.
It's the cheaply build new houses, that are the problem and yes, now is the time to give awareness that you should not build too cheaply and what one can do even with limited ressources. But I fear that the main response will be literal death penalty for some building company owners (morroco is a quite absolutistic monarchy) and otherwise not much change.
While many older structures survive, you don’t see all of those structures built using similar methods that didn’t.
Morocco has had similarly devastating earthquakes in 2004 (6.3) and 1960 (5.8) that killed ~13,000, but the region gets vastly larger earthquakes. In 1969 a 7.8 occurred far enough offshore to only kill 13.
in tfa, houses in the rural areas were the one which took the brunt. also, it's a random poor country, mate. there's a whole world outside the states which has their own situations and other things to be prioritised.
>Sooner or later there will be a ~M 7.5 #earthquake in this region (South-Central Turkey, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon). #deprem
The earthquake happened 3 days after. This seems prescient, until you realize the wording suggests an ambiguous timeline. The area is a known fault zone, one happening "sooner or later" isn't exactly some deep insight. If he knew about that specific earthquake, why didn't he give a more specific prediction of "within the next week"?
Well, does he have some theory how planetary positions play a role in earthquakes, specifically how their positions could lead to an earthquake in turkey but not peru? Is just saying "there will be an earthquake sometime in this earthquake prone region" really that insightful?
FYI: They essentially murdered Semmelweis for not having a theory for how washing hands after examining cadavers and before delivering babies could save lives. He sadly came up with this nutty idea a few decades before we had germ theory and such.
There's a difference between that, where a small additional step improved safety, and this, where the credibility of the prediction would need to be assessed to be able to mobilize the wide response which would be needed ahead of time.
It reads like he had a cognitive degenerative disorder, not that he was committed to an institution for questioning the scientific establishment or whatever
That's not how it sounds to me at all. It sounds to me like no matter what he did, he couldn't escape open hostility to his idea -- based on research where he was a physician in charge of two clinics with different mortality rates -- and was hounded and then punished for failing to cave to social pressure to recant his "nutty" idea.
The world was smaller then. Getting away from toxic social patterns was likely even harder than it is now.
Yes, there is much resistance within the scientific community regarding the influence of the planets and the Moon. But there's no extended research that 'disproves' it. It's merely an assumption. In fact, a scientific paper in Nature suggests otherwise.
"there is much resistance within the scientific community" is the usual euphemism used by pseudo-scientists to justify their claim. There’s absolutely no evidence that you can predict earthquakes by looking at the positions of the planets, and this "researcher" is known for his very vague "predictions" that sometimes appear to be true, sometimes not. It’s the scientific equivalent of a broken clock.
This could have been said before every major scientific discovery.
The scientific community must be wrong by definition if science is to learn something new. It’s more than proven that things most scientists find absurd and impossible end up being doable and proven.
I’d give this person more leeway. He’s not reading astrology, he’s working patterns and clearly has not determined whether his research is accurate yet or not. He himself says there’s not enough data in some regards.
So what is your resistance based off outside of reflexive skepticism ?
> So what is your resistance based off outside of reflexive skepticism ?
This has been debunked over and over [1][2][3][4] and is by no mean different from fortune telling. He has not published a single paper nor has detailed its method, which is summarized by various sources as making a lot of predictions about earthquakes in regions that are known to often have earthquakes. Most of these predictions end up wrong, but we only talk about the "right" ones.
"It’s more than proven that things most scientists find absurd and impossible end up being doable and proven"
Are there many examples besides quantum physics? And eventually and in quite short time, they made their way into the mainstream science, because they modelled the world better. So if this guy can show that his approach can reliable help with predication of earthquakes, he will win. Simple as that. So far I am not convinced, but sure, the moon and the planets are a real force.
Tectonic plates were considered ridiculous. Evolution was debated for decades. Galileo went on trial. Pasteur afaik didn’t find it easy to convince people. Virtually all breakthroughs I can think of, “eminent men” came and told everyone it was hogwash, till it wasn’t.
That’s not say you should defend bad science. Just that great Science might appear like nonsense - at first.
Resistance against evolution likewise. Fueled by religion, not science.
And tectonic plates was just a theory among many, with unclear data at that time. Pasteur likewise.
Real scientists also made mistakes, more so when their reputation is based on the old theory. But in general if there is a new theory that provides a model that works (its calculation fit reality), then it will be adopted. I don't know of a case where this did not happen.
This planetary theory could just be a theory that has “unclear data at the time”, the time being now. Or it could not be. All I’m saying is we have to do the research and double check the evidence for it to be disproven.
Just saying that anyone who says “there’s resistance in the scientific community” can be right or wrong. The COVID vaccine rollout and subsequent confirmation of large amounts of vaccine injury was certainly a good case study. Happened just 24 months ago. There was lots of “resistance” until the papers confirmed a lot of what the naysayers were saying on day 30, but the papers arrived on day 300
I know exactly nothing about this guy. I'm the person who asked for a name.
I was just quoting his own Twitter feed where he himself indicates this is not scientifically proven.
He apparently calls it research. I'm personally fine with that and followed him before it was said here he predicts this based on planetary influences (and hadn't noticed it myself).
Okay, for the record, you are officially an antibeleiver who thinks simply asking the question and investigating it and trying to answer it makes one a nutter.
For the record, I hate this out-of-hand dismissal of anyone who asks "What if..." about anything outside the current Overton Window.
Antibeliever is someone who firmly believes the opposite though it's not actually scientifically proven.
For example, people who say Bigfoot or aliens are absolutely not real and anyone who believes in such is clearly a loon rather than saying "It's unproven and seems extremely unlikely."
That his research subject has not given "proper" scientific results yet (or ever) doesn't make him a fraud. We wouldn't go far if researchers could only research proven concepts.
> That his research subject has not given "proper" scientific results yet (or ever) doesn't make him a fraud. We wouldn't go far if researchers could only research proven concepts.
The problem is we’re looking at the correct predictions only. He’s a broken clock, he "predicted" numerous earthquakes in various regions and only a small number ended up true.
> The idea that planetary alignments can predict earthquakes has been long rebuffed by scientists. The USGS has stated that neither it nor any other scientist is able to predict a specific earthquake, but that it can calculate the probability of future temblors. Andrew Michael, a geophysicist for the agency, called alignment-based predictions "easy to refute" in a statement sent to Snopes.
Confirmation bias is a known human weakness. Based on what little I've seen, he does not appear to be guilty of it. If other people are overemphasizing his "correct" predictions and ignoring his incorrect ones, this should not be conflated with his position.
I've only just learned of his existence. I have no idea why he would publish something like that.
Perhaps it's part of his process for sorting out what works.
I'm disinclined to draw any conclusion one way or another at this point in time about his work. I lack sufficient information and I'm confident quickly scanning his Twitter feed won't adequately fill in the gaps in my knowledge.
>Perhaps it's part of his process for sorting out what works.
He's been doing this for years and has been going on the media circuit touting his predictions. He even works at (founded?) an organization that claims to predict earthquakes. This is obviously not a case of some scientist "sorting out what works".
I've just learned of his existence. I reserve the right to draw my own conclusions in my own time and do not feel compelled to cave to social pressure to spout the "party line".
>I reserve the right to draw my own conclusions in my own time and do not feel compelled to cave to social pressure to spout the "party line".
What a bizarre statement to make after a seemingly reasonable series of exchanges. If you're out of arguments but don't want to change your mind, just admit so. Invoking some sort of persecution complex to justify it is just baffling. Nobody is demanding that you immediately change your mind or publicly recant your beliefs.
> What part of "I haven't made up my mind, I've only just learned he exists" are you failing to grasp?
I'm not sure why you think I'm "failing to grasp" that part. My previous comment literally says
>If you're out of arguments but don't want to change your mind, just admit so.
The part that was "bizzare" to me was
>Invoking some sort of persecution complex to justify it is just baffling. Nobody is demanding that you immediately change your mind or publicly recant your beliefs.
I said several replies to you ago and have reiterated that position:
I'm disinclined to draw any conclusion one way or another at this point in time about his work. I lack sufficient information and I'm confident quickly scanning his Twitter feed won't adequately fill in the gaps in my knowledge.
Changing one's mind requires you to first have a position. You keep arguing for me to see it your way, as if I believe the opposite to be true. I don't.
